The Winter Holidays
by DarkieDucessa
Summary: It's December at the Smash Mansion, everything is blanketed in snow, and the holidays are fast approaching. Some of the Smashers love Christmas; for others, it reminds them of times they'd rather forget. Either way, this Christmas will surely be one to remember... (No hetero, various Yaoi/Yuri abounds. Don't like, don't read.)
1. Snow Shovels and Ice Skates

On the nineteenth of December, the temperature dropped. Nobody really noticed.

On the twentieth of December, the clouds apparently decided to reveal their true, malignant intentions, and unleashed a mighty blizzard upon the entirety of the Smash Mansion and Grounds. Some of the Smashers wondered if Master Hand had decided to make everything a little more festive; others thought maybe Crazy Hand had just wanted to play a prank on everybody.

Either way, on the morning of December the twenty-first there was at least four feet of snow on the ground. It ranged from wet and slushy snow to dry and fluffy, and it lingered in places snow really shouldn't—Norfair, for instance, still had a foot of slushy snow on its platforms, despite the boiling hot lava less than thirty feet below. The Bridge of Eldin was so deep in snow, King Bulblin couldn't charge across, and his bulblin minions didn't even bother to try. Delfino Plaza and Wuhu Island were frozen over entirely.

In the light of these sudden weather conditions, Master Hand finally agreed to Mario and Peach's proposal of a holiday break, as the smash battles could hardly go on with the stages in that state. In exchange, however, the Smashers had to agree to put in a few hours during the week clearing away the snow so the non-flying non-Samus people could actually get around, and they agreed.

…

Which is why, in the early afternoon of December the twenty-first, the hero king of Akaneia and the angel of Skyworld were dressed for the cold and trying to dig out the Battlefield.

If they could find it, that is.

"It's supposed to be right here!" Pit said, listlessly poking around the hole in the snow he'd spent the last half hour digging. "You have _got_ to be kidding me! I _know_ it's here! It's, it's..._rrrgh!_"

Marth glanced around, a frown on his face. "It's the closest stage to the mansion, right? To the left of Final Destination...which I'm pretty sure is over there."

Pit climbed out of his hole and stared vengefully at the mansion. His scarf was itchy, and he was rather annoyed. "Pittoo better have not given me a faulty map..." he growled.

"Pittoo gave you the map?" Marth asked in surprise. "...Since when does he even remember which stage is which, let alone where they are?"

Pit was quiet for a moment. Then he scratched his neck and sighed in frustration. "Stupid Pittoo! You were just messing with me, weren't you!?"

Marth laughed faintly. "Map or no map, this _is_ where I thought the Battlefield was..."

"How can we even lose an entire stage..." Pit growled. "Shouldn't there be some platforms sticking up in the air? Or something?"

"The blizzard knocked out power to half the stages early on," Marth explained. "So the platforms went down before most of the snow fell. Master Hand didn't mention that?"

Pit had been wondering how to trick Pittoo into letting Pit cover him in snow so as to make a "snow angel," instead of listening, during Master Hand's briefing. Inwardly, he punched himself. "I must've missed that," he mumbled.

"Well, that's why it's important to dig these out as soon as possible," Marth went on. "So we can fix them...you know?"

"Except we can't _find_ them," the angel grumbled. "He should've made Samus do this, so she could use her X-ray visor or whatever. Thermal visor? Would that have helped? Probably."

Marth nodded absently, looking around again. "...Okay," he said after a minute. "Maybe _that's_ Final Destination, and _that_ is actually the Wii Fit Studio...?"

"Well, Battlefield isn't here, so I'll go with that," Pit said, even though he wasn't quite sure where all the _thats_ that Marth was referring to were. "Where now?"

"...That way," the bluenette said definitively. "We'll give that a shot."

…

On the other side of the Smash Grounds, at Delfino Plaza, Princess Peach was trying to coax Samus Aran into trying on some shoes.

"Come _onnn_," the blond pleaded, still holding out the pink ice skates. "They're really comfortable, and then you can just whiz about the ice! Super fast! It's really easy! Pleeeease?"

"Why is pink the only color you ever wear?" Samus asked, trying to change the subject. She was in her full Power Suit, sans the helmet, as it was still very cold out—she didn't understand how Peach could be fine with only the added warmth of socks, mittens, and a scarf.

"I have other color dresses!" Peach protested. "...But all my ice skates are pink. So what? Come on, Samus, it won't be any fun without you!"

"I highly doubt that," the bounty hunter stated, crossing her arms. "You and Zelda are perfectly capable of enjoying yourselves without me."

"But it's Christmas," Peach whined.

"Not yet," Samus corrected.

"Fine, _almost_ Christmas," the princess grumbled. "It's still winter! Holiday season! You wouldn't help me put up Christmas lights, so you have to ice skate with me!"

"...I did help you put up the Christmas lights," Samus said, frowning slightly. "I found you the ladder, the hooks to put them on, the extension cords, the lights _themselves—_"

"Regardless," Peach interceded quickly, "you're still going to ice skate with me."

"I am not."

"Please please pleeease? Pretty please? With a cherry on top?"

"I don't like cherries."

"Stop nitpicking my begging!" Peach pouted. "Please, Samus. One lap around the ice. That's all I'm asking."

Samus knew her well. "And when I'm out there, you'll insist on one more...and then one more...and then just one more..."

"One lap, I promise! Or I'll make everyone call you 'Sammy' for a month!"

The bounty hunter narrowed her eyes. "...You wouldn't."

Peach smirked. "I would too."

Samus adopted a bored expression and glanced away. "Well," she said airily, "then _I_ won't speak to you for a month."

The princess's face fell. "Y-You can't do that! I have all this holiday stuff for us planned! Making holiday sweaters—singing Christmas carols—cookies!" She fell to her knees at Samus' feet dramatically and gripped her leg. "_We can't-a make Christmas cookies if you-a won't talk-a to me, Samus!_" she said desperately.

Samus resisted a smile. The princess was far too predictable. "Then may I skip ice skating?" she asked.

Peach seemed to consider it for a minute. Then she got a devilish glint in her eyes. "...Zelda will be very disappointed," she said sweetly.

Samus grimaced. "Bringing her up is cheating."

The princess laughed. "Since when are there rules?"

"Since I made them," Samus replied smoothly.

"Well, I don't follow those rules!" Peach hopped to her feet and turned to the door, pushing it open slightly. "Hey, Zelda!" she shouted. "Come in here, will you?"

Samus did a facepalm and sighed deeply. "It's just sliding around on ice," she muttered. "What's so fun about that?"

"You wouldn't know, you've never done it," Peach retorted.

Just then, Zelda came in, slightly breathless. She, unlike the blond princess, had dressed more for the weather; she wore a big poofy purple coat, thick black mittens, a long red and white scarf, and a matching red and white hat. She did still have her dress on, but she'd removed all the metallic elements, so as to be softer if she fell. She was holding a pair of pink ice skates by the laces, and her dark gray socks were soaked through. She'd already been skating, and her smiling face was flushed red. "What is it, Peach?" she asked.

Samus tried not to stare. _Zelda really is pretty when her face is all pink like that..._ Then she shook herself slightly, pushing those thoughts out of her head.

"Oh, Samus just had something she wanted to say," Peach said teasingly. "What was it, Sammy? You were going to...?"

The bounty hunter grimaced. Zelda was looking at her expectantly now, her blue eyes seemingly sparkling. "Yes, Samus?"

"...I was going to say I...I'll be out in a minute," Samus said wearily, defeated.

Zelda's smile brightened. "Oh, good! I was worried you wouldn't come," she said cheerfully.

Peach grinned and held out the ice skates. Samus sighed again.

…

Elsewhere on the Smash Grounds, Pit had dug another hole and found Yoshi's Island. He was on top of one of the orange blocks that normally would have fallen through; as it was, with the power off, they just sat on the grass and didn't do anything.

He stood up, and the snow he'd piled up beside the hole was just short of his height. He looked up at Marth helplessly. "Does it need to be the Battlefield we dig out?"

"What's down there?" the bluenette asked, craning to see.

"Yoshi's Island..."

Marth frowned. "...Well, it is one of the ones that lost power...so, we can probably dig it out instead."

Pit sighed in relief, tugging slightly at his scarf. "Oh, phew! I really don't want to tramp around for another hour trying to figure out where that is..."

Marth laughed, then picked up his shovel. "I guess we'd better get to work, then."

Pit nodded, then briefly looked around. All the snow suddenly seemed like a lot more than it had when they were just walking through it...

"This is gonna take _forever!_" he blurted out.

"Guess we'd better get started, then," Marth replied with a smile.

…

At Delfino, Samus had succeeded in her first shaky lap of the ice, and was working on her second. She'd been forced to switch to the Zero Suit to put the skates on, and despite the suit's insulation, she was a bit cold.

Ice skating didn't seem like such a difficult thing when you weren't actually doing it, but now that she was actually trying it, she couldn't figure out why it was so hard. Her ankles wobbled uncontrollably in the size-too-small pink skates, and she held her hands out slightly to the side just to keep her balance. She was growing increasingly frustrated with herself—a frustration that only increased every time Peach smoothly whizzed by, happy as can be.

A fuzzy mitten suddenly clamped around her wrist, and Samus turned to look down into Zelda's cerulean eyes. "You doing alright?" the hylian asked, looking concerned.

"Fine," Samus muttered. "Just fine." She noted that Zelda didn't wobble, but slid along the ice quite smoothly.

"Have you never skated before?" Zelda queried.

"No," the blond admitted. "Why would I have? I always had work to do."

Zelda frowned slightly. "But you've been here at the Mansion longer than most of us," she stated. "There was snow here several times, was there not?"

"Yes, well, Peach never dragged me out skating before," Samus grumbled.

"Certainly she's tried..."

"Certainly I've refused."

"Why?"

"It seems so pointless. Sliding around on ice...what fun is in that?"

Zelda smiled. "The fun, my dear Samus, is when you get better at it," she said sweetly. "So perhaps I can give you a few pointers?"

"Fine," the blond replied, a little too hastily. But she wasn't about to turn down Zelda's help.

The brunette's smile widened. "Okay! The first thing is learning how to push yourself along. You don't want to take 'steps', you need to _slide_ your skates on the ice, like so..."

…

Working together, Pit and Marth had managed to dig out several square feet of the buried stage, but every time Pit looked up from the snow at his feet it seemed like there was even more to be done.

For the moment, he stuck his shovel in the snow beside him and wiped beads of sweat from his forehead. "How long have we been out here, you think?" he asked wearily.

Marth tossed another shovelful off to the side, where they'd been piling the snow, and shrugged. "Two hours, maybe?"

Pit sighed faintly. He tugged at his scarf, scratched his neck, then finally tore it off in annoyance and tossed it away. "Stupid thing's too itchy!" he complained.

Marth paused, then set down his shovel and knelt in the snow to pick up the discarded scarf. He ran it through his fingers thoughtfully. "It's not a bad scarf," he commented. "I like the reindeer."

The angel glanced over at him. "It has reindeer?"

Marth laughed. "You never noticed?"

"I was distracted by the itchy."

The bluenette laughed again, then rolled the scarf up and put it in his coat pocket. "I'll hang on to this until you want it," he stated.

"I'll be fine," Pit said. "I don't need it."

"That doesn't mean you won't want it," Marth replied.

There was a brief moment of silence. Then Pit stretched his wings as far as he could, deep in the snow as he was, and asked; "Did someone make you that scarf, actually?"

"This?" Marth picked up one of the ends of his long blue scarf, and smiled faintly. "...Yes. My sister, Elice, took up knitting one year, when I was thirteen...she made me three of these. They were so itchy, but I thought if I took them off she'd be upset..." His eyes lowered slightly. "...Anyway. We should probably get back to digging."

Pit was struck by the realization that he didn't actually know the blue-haired hero king very well at all. They got along, sure, but he didn't even know Marth had a sister until now...

_ Well, he sends letters home all the time,_ the angel thought reasonably, _so of course he must have people back there he cares about. What other family does he have I don't know about..._

Not really thinking, he asked that last question aloud; "What other family do you have?"

Now Marth looked a little sad. "...Not much," he admitted. "I...my parents died when I was young. Elice is married...and...so was I, once, but that didn't..." He glanced away and bit his lip, hesitating.

Then he looked back at Pit, a smile on his face that didn't quite reach his eyes. "We can't chitchat all day if we're going to dig this out!" he said. "Let's get back to work. Think about how we can sleep in tomorrow if we get all our hours done today..."

Marth picked up his shovel and started tossing snow away again. Pit stared at him for a moment, then retrieved his own shovel with a sigh and started digging again.

_I really should talk to him more..._ he thought.

…

Samus was getting the hang of it now, and though she was still a little shaky, she made a mostly smooth lap around the ice with ease. She was still a little unsure of herself, though, and was glad to have Zelda on her arm in case she lost her balance.

Though the blond wasn't talking much herself, the brunette seemed to enjoy chatting as they glided over the frozen water, and was still talking even now.

"...and I always tell him to brush his teeth before he goes to bed, but half the time he skips it just to annoy me!" she was saying, her voice a little fretful. "For a hero who saved the world twice, he can be so..._immature_ sometimes."

"I imagine that's how most children are," Samus found herself saying, quietly. "Even heroes."

"Yes, indeed," Zelda agreed. Then; "Oh, Samus, that was your tenth lap and you barely leaned on me at all! You really are picking this up fast!"

Despite herself, Samus smiled faintly. "I have a good teacher," she mumbled.

Zelda smiled bashfully. "Why, thank you, but I didn't learn this half as fast as you have."

"When did you start skating?" Samus asked, a little curious.

"Oh, a long time ago," the princess said wistfully. "...I couldn't have been more than eight. The winter got so cold that the fountain in Castle Town froze over, and the other children had started skating on it. I begged my father to let me join them, but he refused..." She paused. "So I sneaked out of the castle one morning and went down, dressed as a peasant girl. Another girl let me borrow her sister's skates, and they taught me how to do it. That was a fun day..."

Her voice trailed off dreamily, and she stared off into the distance, lost in her thoughts. As she wasn't paying attention to where she was going, Samus had to catch her arm and turn them both as they neared the plaza; her legs wobbled, but she succeeded, and they kept gliding.

Zelda snapped out of it and laughed faintly. "I got in such big trouble later, of course! But the year after that my father actually allowed me to go out, and so I managed to keep practicing."

"How about Peach?" Samus asked, gesturing her head towards the cheerful blond princess some distance away.

"Oh," Zelda laughed again, "she told me she was such a willful little girl, she could bully her guards into letting her do what_ever_ she wanted. She made them take her out to the lake every winter, when it froze, so she could skate. I'm sure she was even more trouble than Tink!"

"Probably, yes," Samus agreed. "Still is."

Zelda laughed, quite charmingly, and the blond resisted the urge to smile again.

…

By the time they'd dug all the way to the pipe on the far left side of the island, both Pit and Marth were soaked through and getting rather tired. They'd been out three, maybe even four hours, as the sun was getting quite low on the horizon now.

The angel dropped his shovel and fell backwards onto the snow with a long, tired sigh. "How are we still not _done,_" he lamented. "We've been out here _forever!_"

"Do you not like the snow?" Marth queried, setting his shovel down more carefully.

"No," Pit replied. "It's cold and wet and it gets everywhere."

"But that's what's so pretty about it," Marth said gently. "It gives everything a blanket of white...don't you just love how the world looks when it's like that?"

"What, cold and monotone?" Pit asked roughly.

"No..." The hero king smiled faintly. "It's not cold, rather...soft. A soft whiteness, that falls gently from the sky to cover the land in purity...like how everything looks when the snow's just fallen, you know? Not a footprint to be seen, just...white. Simple, unadorned, beautiful white..."

He paused, then looked away bashfully. If he wasn't already flushed red from the cold, he'd probably be blushing. "I'm, er, I'm not making any sense, am I?"

Pit laughed quietly. "No, you're...you're fine. It is kinda pretty, if you think about it that way."

Marth smiled shyly, then lay back in the snow himself, arms extended. "Winter was always my favorite season, actually..."

"I'm more of a summer person myself," Pit admitted. "Still, I guess winter isn't all that bad."

"Does it ever snow in Skyworld?" Marth asked.

"Not usually," Pit replied, "but sometimes Lady Palutena moves it lower to get beneath the snow clouds, and then we get some! I do like making snowmen, but Pittoo thinks they're silly, so he's no help at all." The angel smiled to himself. "We didn't really have Christmas back in my world, but last winter I was there we made cookies and muffins and hot chocolate and camped out around a fire, and I tried to get everyone to sing with me but they refused. Those were the days, though..."

He turned his head to look at Marth. The hero king had his eyes closed, a smile still on his face. "Did you have Christmas, back in Akaneia?" Pit asked.

"We had a winter holiday that was similar..." Marth replied softly. "We gave gifts and decorated a tree. When I was young, I had this one ornament—a little gold star, with snowflake designs around the base. I always insisted on putting it on the top of the tree, and Elice or my mother would help me get a ladder and hold it while I climbed up to place the star."

"Did you give gifts to all your friends, too?" the angel queried.

"No..." Marth sounded a little sad. "I was a prince; the royal family didn't associate with commoners for holidays. And my father was almost never around that time of year, either, so it was usually just the three of us. We still had fun, though...winter holidays were the only time I could convince my mother to come out with us and play in the snow, so we always did that. We made snowmen and...have you ever made a snow angel, actually?"

Pit blinked. "That would be a heck of a snowman! Do you actually sculpt the wings, or—"

"No, no," Marth interceded with a laugh. "A snow angel is when you lie in the snow, and you flap your arms and legs, like this..."

He started moving his arms and legs up and down in the snow, clearing out indentations with his movement, and then stood up carefully so as not to disturb his creation. "See?"

Pit sat up and agreed that yes, the indentation Marth had made did look a bit like an angel. "You probably wouldn't have done those anyway, though," Marth said, looking a little embarrassed. "I mean, you _are_ an angel, and you have wings, so..."

Pit glanced at the spot where he'd lain in the snow. "Well, mine does look a lot like an angel," he said lightly. "That looked fun, though. Maybe if I lie on my stomach..."

"I wouldn't advise that," Marth said, and they both laughed.

"What did you do for the holidays, the last year you were in Akaneia?" Pit asked, slightly hesitantly.

Marth was quiet for a long moment. "...Well," he said softly. "After Altea was invaded, I never cared much for...celebrations. I always spent the holidays in my room, when I lived in Talys...And after the wars, I was always so busy. I guess that's why my father was never around. As it is, I...I barely remember what my last winter holiday there was like..."

Pit looked up at him, and there was no mistaking the sadness in the hero king's eyes. "...And you've always skipped Christmas while you've been here, at the mansion?" he asked.

Marth nodded, almost imperceptibly. "I don't actively avoid everything when Peach puts up Christmas lights and a tree, but I don't really participate, either. I guess I haven't...felt like it, in a long time."

The bluenette's eyes were closed, and the angel, suddenly, wanted him to stop being sad. Impulsively, he slid his hand into Marth's, and gave his fingers a squeeze. Marth looked back at him, eyes slightly lowered. "We really shouldn't be so sad all the time," Pit said. "Um..."

"We don't have much further to go," Marth interceded, looking away towards his shovel and the half-buried stage. "We ought to get back to work."

"...Yeah." Pit reluctantly let go of the hero king's hand, and went to retrieve his shovel. He tried to remember what he'd wanted to say, but the words doggedly refused to come back to him.

"...Let's get back to work."

…

Peach finally slowed herself down enough to meet up with Samus and Zelda, and linked her arm through the former's, so the three of them glided alongside each other. "So how's it been going with you two?" she asked, a slightly teasing tone in her voice. "Enjoying yourself yet, Samus?"

"No," the bounty hunter replied automatically.

The blond princess laughed. "Come on, I know that's not true! Zelda, is that true?"

"Of course it is," Zelda said with a smile. "We've both been perfectly miserable over here the entire time."

Both princesses laughed. Samus felt a little ganged-up on. "If you already decided the answer, why did you ask?"

"I don't 'decide' answers!" Peach protested. "But anyway, I'm glad you're having fun. It's not so hard once you get into it, right?"

"Once someone tells you how..."

"It's not my fault I thought you knew!"

"...How is that not your fault?"

"It isn't because I say it isn't." Peach smiled wickedly. "Besides, I'm sure _Zelda_ was a much better teacher than I would've been."

"Um...thanks," Zelda said hesitantly.

Samus just narrowed her eyes. As much as she liked spending time with the brunette princess, she _didn't_ like how Peach tried to put them together at every possible opportunity.

...Okay, maybe she didn't exactly _mind_ being with Zelda at every possible opportunity, but Peach didn't have to be so smug about it.

"It's starting to get dark," was all she said aloud.

"Oh, hardly at all!" Peach insisted. "We've got plenty of light left!"

"But it must be nearly six by now."

"And didn't you tell Rosalina you would help her make dinner tonight?" Zelda queried.

The blond's face fell immensely, and her eyes widened with panic. "Oh no! I _did_ tell-a her that! Oh no! Oh _no!_ I'm-a going to be so _late!_" Pulling her arm out of Samus', she turned and skated off towards the plaza in a hurry.

Zelda laughed. "Poor Peach. She's been planning this dinner all week."

"It's her own fault for forgetting," Samus retorted.

"Yes, setting the two of us up does seem to take priority in her mind, doesn't it?"

It took Samus a long, heart-pounding moment to realize the princess was joking. She forced herself to laugh, faintly. "U-um, yes, indeed."

Zelda smiled sweetly, apparently unaware of the stammer. "Shall we go in as well? I wouldn't mind getting a hot drink and defrosting for awhile."

Samus nodded, slightly distracted by her thoughts.

…

The sun had just disappeared below the horizon when Marth and Pit tossed the last shovelfuls of snow out of Yoshi's Island.

"Phew! We're done!" Marth said cheerfully. "Thank gods we won't have to do that again, eh?"

"Yeah," Pit agreed.

"Well, I'm starving," the bluenette laughed, climbing out of the hole and onto the snow above, "so if you're ready to go in, so am I."

"Marth?"

"Hmm?" The hero king glanced back down at the angel. "Yes?"

Pit hesitated. "...I don't want you to, um...I don't want you to be sad on Christmas."

Marth was quiet for a moment. "...What do you mean?"

I mean," —the angel flapped his wings a couple times and landed lightly on the snow next to Marth— "I don't want you to be sad on Christmas anymore. I can tell you are—you get this look in your eyes, every time you talk about it. I don't know if it's because you miss your family or if something happened, but you're definitely sad about it!"

"Pit, I'm fine..." the bluenette said quietly. "I'm fine."

"I don't think you are," the angel insisted. He switched his shovel to his other hand and put his free one into Marth's again. "So I thought, um...m-maybe you'd spend Christmas with me?"

Marth blinked. "...Pit, I-I..."

"C-cause, you know," Pit continued hastily, "if you have sad memories from Christmas, then you need to make some happy ones, right? S-so...we could spend the holiday break together. Decorate a tree, give presents, do Christmas-y things...make you some happy memories, so when you think of Christmas, you won't be sad." He looked up at the hero king, his eyes a little pleading, and desperately hoped he didn't come off as pushy. "Please?"

Marth looked down at him, his eyes a little wide. And then, unexpectedly, he pulled Pit close to him in a hug and made a noise halfway between a laugh and a sob.

"Th-thanks, Pit," he said shakily, his voice slightly muffled by the angel's hair. "I-I'm sorry, I'm really emotional r-right now, I just..."

"It's alright," Pit assured him, wrapping his arms around the hero king's waist. He liked the way Marth's hands felt on his back, just brushing his feathers. "It's alright."

When Marth next spoke, his voice was barely a whisper. "...You're the f-first person who noticed...since R-Roy..."

_Right. The second boy from Marth's world, Roy...he left before I came to the mansion..._

"Is that why you're sad?" Pit asked, hesitantly. "Because he noticed you and then...left?"

He thought Marth might have nodded, but it was hard to tell. The angel closed his eyes and smiled. "I'm not leaving, Marth," he whispered. "...I promise, I'm not leaving."

When the hero king finally let Pit go, and stepped back, he had such a smile on his face that the angel felt his heart melt. It was the sweetest, most genuine expression he'd ever seen. "...Thank you, Pit," Marth said gently, and Pit could see the faintest glisten of tears on his cheeks. "...Thank you...and...yes. I'll...spend Christmas with you."

Pit smiled, too. He liked the way his name sounded when Marth said it.

"Then I'll do my best," he said quietly, "to make this your best Christmas ever."

…

At the mansion, Peach and Rosalina's dinner had been completed on schedule, half of the Smashers were done with their work hours, and everybody was sleepy and relaxed.

Zelda and Samus were sitting together in front of the great fireplace in the main room of the mansion. The princess was wrapped in a blanket, and both held steaming-hot cups of peppermint tea. Samus had never really cared for tea, but when Zelda made it it wasn't half-bad.

"Thanks for coming ice skating with us today, Samus," Zelda said softly.

"No problem," the blond mumbled vaguely.

"Seriously." Zelda sat up a little. "I know Peach used me to coerce you into coming out, and I'm sorry for that, but...we had fun today, didn't we?"

Samus blinked, then smiled. "...Yeah. I guess we did."

From somewhere behind them, Rufure's voice loudly exclaimed; "You have _got_ to be kidding me!"

Twisting around, Samus looked out the window and saw that snow was falling. "It's...is it really snowing again?" she said, a little startled.

Zelda looked over to see for herself, then laughed. "Oh, dear. At least we haven't put in our work hours already..."

Several of the Smashers who _had_ worked that day were voicing their complaints—Pit and Shulk were some of the loudest. Samus tuned them out and looked back at the fire. "I wonder if it will snow all week..." she murmured.

Zelda smiled, took a sip of her tea, and leaned against Samus' shoulder. "If it does, then we'll be in for a very white Christmas," she said lightly. "I think I'd like that..."

Samus glanced at her, then smiled as well. "It wouldn't be so bad," she agreed. "Though getting around might be a problem."

"I'll have to rely on you to carry me, then, Lady Aran," Zelda murmured playfully. "Can I count on your assistance, my lady?"

"...Of course, Your Majesty," was the bounty hunter's soft reply. "I'll take you wherever you want to go."

The princess gently slid her arm around Samus' waist and released a little sigh of contentment. "And I shall hold you to that, my lady Aran..."

Samus' smile had yet to fade.

_And I will be happy to oblige, Princess Zelda..._

* * *

**_A/N:_**

_So, after trying to think of a good winter/Christmas-themed story all month, I finally get an idea for one.  
...A four-part story.  
...A week before Christmas.  
...I just like to stress myself out, don't I? XP_

_So yes, there should be three more chapters for this, following various yaoi/yuri pairings during the holiday season. As some people don't like hetero, I thought I'd write something that didn't have any of it at all. Fun, eh~? :3  
_

_(On another note, I like the idea that Peach slips into a stereotypical/Mario Italian accent when she's overly emotional. ...I don't know why. :P)_

_Guess we'll have to see if I can actually write this before Christmas...XD_

_Thanks for reading! Reviews are always very much appreciated, and I hope you enjoyed~_

**_~DarkieDucessa_**


	2. Letters to Home and One Christmas Wreath

By dawn of the twenty-second of December, there was almost a whole new foot of snow on top of that which had already fallen, and the Hands decided that more drastic measures than Smashers with snow shovels were required. So snowplows were acquired and attached to the Blue Falcon, Samus' Gunship, and the Arwings, and the pilots of said ships were "asked" (read: ordered) to get to work on the grounds.

A light snow was still falling, however, so most of the Smashers decided it was a good day to stay indoors. Pit had commandeered the kitchen from Princess Peach, and was supposedly teaching Marth how to make Christmas cookies, even though neither of them actually knew how to in the first place. Zelda and the Wii Fit Trainers were repairing some of the Christmas lights Peach had put up a few days previously, as some of the hooks had fallen out of the wall and needed to be put in again.

Peach herself was sitting on the floor with a wide array of Christmas cards spread out around her, and was picking one every so often to scribble a message on the inside and tuck it away in an envelope. Not far from her, sitting in a cushy armchair with a snowflake-pattern blanket wrapped about her, Rosalina was quietly reading to the Lumas, Pokemon, and various others that hung about her.

Rufure—also known as "the male Robin," though he considered that term rather demeaning—was trying to get the fire started again. He'd built it less than half an hour ago, but he hadn't really been thinking about it at the time, and it hadn't lasted very long before the flames flickered out and died.

He ripped off a piece of cardboard from a box that had once held bananas, and shoved it under a piece of kindling, next to the strips of an old _Mushroom Daily_ newspaper. Then he got half a round from the pile next to the fireplace, and tucked it in next to the charred remains of the last log.

The Windfall Island souvenir matchbox only had two matches left, and both of them sputtered out in his hands before the newspaper caught on. He cursed as the second one nearly burned his fingers, shaking his hand to cool it off and wondering how the newspaper could really fail to catch on—it was paper, for Naga's sake, it was supposed to be _easy_ to burn.

With a sigh, he gave in and put his hand over the fireplace, muttering a few words in an ancient tongue. A small burst of fire bounced from his palm, and this time the newspaper lit up in flames. A moment later, the cardboard caught on as well.

He leaned back on his heels and surveyed his work with satisfaction. Behind him, he could hear Rosalina's gentle voice, carefully enunciating each work of the storybook;

_"He saw all sorts of trees...big ones, small ones, crooked ones, and straight ones. Finally, he found the most beautiful Christmas tree of all. It was not too big, or too small...It was not too crooked, or too straight. It was just right."_

Rufure couldn't say he knew the story, but he noticed that her other listeners were hanging onto every word. It was really her voice—soft, a little hypnotic—that drew them in, he figured. A natural storyteller's voice—he'd known a few others with a voice like that.

_"Dragon looked down and saw the tree's beautiful brown trunk,_" Rosalina continued. _"It stood firm and strong in the frozen earth."_

_Chrom's isn't quite like that,_ Rufure thought aimlessly. _I mean, it's strong, authoritative...Just not so hypnotic. It doesn't draw you in unless you really listen to it, and then it's..._

_ "He looked up and saw its beautiful green branches. They waved back and forth in the cold December wind."_ Rosalina's voice lowered just slightly, so Rufure had to lean back a little further to catch the next few words. _"...Dragon could not cut down such a lovely tree."_

Rufure smiled. _That sounds like when Lissa made me help her find a tree for the holidays last year...she wasn't happy with any of them, and when we finally found a good one she thought it was too nice to cut down, and too much of a hassle anyway._ That girl's niece, Lucina, was on the other side of the room, pretending to read a Dreamland magazine and wearing a truly ghastly holiday sweater. _Lissa really can be weird about the strangest things..._

Just beyond Lucina, sitting in a window alcove with his cape wrapped around him, was the Radiant Hero of legend. Ike had a piece of paper against his knees, a pencil in hand, and was chewing on the end of the latter as he stared out the window at the falling snow. A pile of crumpled papers lay on the ground beneath the alcove, as well.

_Wonder what he's working on,_ Rufure mused.

He'd missed part of the next line of the story, distracted by thoughts as he was, but now he tuned back in;

_"...silver bells, and everything he needed to make his tree even more beautiful,"_ Rosalina was saying in that same soft voice, and turned the page. _"That night, Dragon looked out at his Christmas tree shining in the night. It was truly perfect."_ She paused, then smiled and turned the page again. "...Chapter Two; The Candy Wreath. _One day in December, Dragon had a good idea..._"

Rufure tore himself away from the sound of her voice, and got to his feet, brushing a little ash from the fire off his hands. His overcoat and boots were upstairs in his room, and he just wore the light tan tank top and beige pants he usually wore under everything else. He'd thought himself under-dressed, until he'd seen Marth in shorts and a violently festive T-shirt he must've borrowed from somebody (anybody) else; after that, Rufure figured it was hard to look truly strange amongst this crazy cast he'd come to know.

Lucina didn't even glance up from her magazine as he walked by, but she wasn't who he wanted to talk to anyway. Ike didn't react to the sound of footsteps, either, and only turned when Rufure spoke up;

"Hey, Ike."

"Oh...hey," the hero mumbled. "Need something?"

"No," Rufure said, a little awkwardly. "Just wondering what you were doing."

"This..." Ike glanced over the edge at the papers on the ground, then back to the blank page before him. "Not much. Just letters to home."

"I see." The tactician paused. "...You write multiple drafts of your letters?"

Ike laughed faintly. "Only when they're to someone...really important," he said quietly.

"Ah..." Rufure nodded understandingly. "Girlfriend?"

"Husband," Ike replied calmly.

The tactician, to his credit, didn't do too much of a visible double-take. "I, ah, I see," he stuttered.

Ike flashed him a faint smile. "You don't have to pretend to not be surprised," he said, amused. "I'll understand."

Rufure took a moment to gather his thoughts. "...I, um...I never heard of that," he admitted hesitantly.

"In your Ylissean history books, you mean..." Ike looked back out the window. "It's not exactly common knowledge. Men having...relationships, like this...it isn't really common back home. And there were other interfering factors, and...so on, and so on. We keep it quiet."

"But you're the Hero of Blue Flames," Rufure said, frowning slightly. "You don't...you don't get married, you go off on a journey and are never seen again."

Ike smiled wryly. "Why would I do that? I like my home. I don't plan on going anywhere, once I finally get back."

The tactician was a little befuddled. "But, the stories I heard..."

"They didn't mention Marth's divorce, either, did they?" Ike asked, almost to himself. "...Ylisse seems to have forgotten much of its history, from what I can tell."

"Well...Marth was the Hero-King," Rufure said reasonably. "Of course the people telling history...they'd want people to remember him for his deeds, not for his personal life. They wanted him to appear the hero, who united the continent under one rule and lived happily ever after."

"So, the historians covered up his ugly marriage, the horrible things his wife did, just so they could have their fairy tale ending?" Ike asked. "Lovely historians you have, Rufure."

"...At least ours tell us what we need to know," the tactician said a little bitterly. "Instead of obscuring important things like whether there are one or two goddesses, and whether one is sleeping in a certain medallion...?"

Ike snorted. "Guess historians never get it quite right. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm trying to think of how best to say the things I want to say to the man I love. Feel free to go tell your historians that, so they can fix their books." Then he turned a little further towards the window, leaned forward over his page, and started scribbling.

Rufure knew when to back off, and decided this was the best time to retreat. Before he did, though, he sneakily grabbed one of Ike's rough drafts from the floor and hid it in his pocket.

_Nothing wrong with getting a little reading material for later,_ he thought, and then tried to put away his growing feeling of guilt.

…

Upstairs, in the room he shared with the Robins (due to something about cutbacks), Chrom was trying to decide where to hang a Christmas wreath.

Robin had left it on his bed that morning in a box that also contained various other decorations, as well as a note asking if he would put them up in the room for her—she would be out all day, putting up posts around parts of various stages to keep Captain Falcon from running them over and causing even more damage. Seeing as he had nothing else to do, Chrom had set about the task quite cheerfully, and had put up everything else in the box—the intricately painted balls, the silver and golden bells, the eighteen-foot strand of woven holly and colorful lights shaped like pinecones (which he just barely managed to get to reach the outlet by the door), the scented Christmas candles in their festive holders on the dresser.

All that was left was this one wreath, and he honestly had no idea what to do with it. There was another one already on the outside of the door, and he thought two on the same door would be pushing it; there didn't seem to be much room on the walls, however, so he had a bit of a problem.

It wasn't even the nicest wreath, he found himself thinking as he stared futilely at the walls for the umpteenth time. It was a peculiar braid of wood and some kind of silver tinsel, which seemed to be falling out; there had also once been chocolate candies attached to the wreath, but Robin and Lucina had eaten most of them, and now there were just a few sad little ones in random places.

(One was actually about to fall off even as he looked at it, and he resisted the temptation to eat it.)

He wondered if she might not notice if he just didn't put it up at all. He looked down at the wreath and glared at it. "Does she like you a lot, or will she be mad at me if I put you away?" he asked aloud.

The wreath, obviously, didn't respond.

"...She probably will be," he answered himself. "Which means I need to find somewhere to put you. Where do you want me to put you?"

The wreath was maddeningly silent. The loose piece of candy fell off, and Chrom absently caught it, unwrapped it, and ate it. It was a little old, but still tasted fine.

"...Hmmm." He frowned. "Over her bed? Over Rufure's bed. Preferably not over mine; you're kind of losing your tinsel and I'd rather not wake up with that all over my face."

He thought vaguely that the wreath was taunting him.

"Well, where do you want to go, then!?" he demanded in frustration.

Some tinsel fell off onto his feet.

"Oh, so _that's_ how it is," he said with a smirk. "Well, two can play at _that_ game—"

"Who are you talking to?"

Chrom cut himself off and spun around, hiding the wreath behind his back as Rufure walked into the room. "N-nobody!" he said quickly. "Myself. Why?"

"...Because from outside the room, you sounded like a crazy person," the tactician said carefully. "What are you holding behind your back?"

"Oh..." Embarrassed, Chrom showed Rufure the wreath. "Robin told me to put up her Christmas decorations, and I can't figure out where to put this. So I was, um, asking it where it wanted me to put it."

Rufure chuckled. "She's got you doing her dirty work, eh?"

"Well, she's out there putting up posts and whatnot," Chrom said. "This is the least I could do, right?"

"Yeah..." Quite casually, Rufure picked a candy off the wreath and ate it. "On the door?" he suggested, his voice a little slurred from the thick chocolate.

"I thought two wreaths would be too much for that," the exalt stated.

The tactician shrugged. "Well, that one's on its last legs, so it probably won't last long. You might as well." He walked over to the bunk bed the two of them shared, and hoisted himself up onto the top bunk, which was where he slept. "You might want to sweep the floor when you're done, too," he added lightly.

Chrom eyed the fallen silver tinsel on the floor menacingly. "Yes, I noticed..."

He tossed the wreath back into the box for now, and went to get the broom. When he came back, Rufure was leaning against the wall and reading a crumpled piece of paper.

"What's that?" Chrom asked, curious.

"Just a thing I grabbed," the tactician replied elusively.

Chrom made a few halfhearted sweeps at the tinsel, then persisted; "What thing?"

Rufure sighed faintly. "It's something Ike was writing. Rough drafts at letters home, to his husband..."

The exalt frowned. "...One, reading someone's personal things is very rude," he said. "And two, when did he get married?"

"I know, and I don't know," Rufure answered vaguely. "He said they kept it quiet because of 'various issues' or something."

Chrom set down the broom and climbed up to Rufure's bunk. "And why do you have Ike's rough drafts, exactly?" he queried.

The tactician glanced up from his page at Chrom, then set it down with another sigh. "He had tons of them, lying on the floor. I just grabbed one. If he didn't want people to read it, he would've thrown them out already, right?"

"He may not have gotten around to it yet," Chrom retorted, very seriously. "You shouldn't read those."

"It's in the interest of history," Rufure protested.

The exalt leaned over and took the page from the tactician's hands, then crumpled it up in his hands. "History doesn't need to know what Ike doesn't want it to know," he replied.

"That doesn't even make sense," Rufure said. "Hero or not, Ike doesn't get to control history; those that come after him are the ones who do that. And that's us."

"So because we were born after him, that means we should be allowed to read his mail?" Chrom queried.

Rufure paused. "...You don't have to make it sound so bad."

"I'm just being honest. Do you have any others?"

"...No."

"Honesty, Robin."

"None, I promise."

"Good." Chrom turned and slid down off the bunk again. "I'll toss this out with all this damned tinsel..."

"Chrom?"

The exalt glanced over, just as the white-haired boy climbed down from the top bunk. "What?"

"Why do you still call me that?"

The bluenette paused. "...Robin, you mean?"

"Yes. Everybody else just calls me that nickname Crazy Hand made up—Rufure—or 'the male Robin', but to you I'm just...Robin." Rufure paused. "...Why?"

"...Well, it's your name, isn't it?" Chrom said lightly. "I imagine you prefer to be called by your real name."

"But there's...two of us," the tactician mumbled. "How can you keep us straight if we're both Robin to you—you don't get confused?"

Chrom thought for a moment. "I do suppose I refer to you as Rufure sometimes in my mind, when I'm thinking of both of you. But, honestly, it's not that hard."

"How is it easy for you?"

Chrom was startled by the pleading tone that had entered Rufure's voice. "I, um..." The exalt hesitated. "...I guess I just spend most of my time thinking of only one of you," he admitted. "If I need to, I'll use the nickname, but generally there's just one Robin in my mind. And...well, I think he likes his real name more than any nickname."

Rufure stared at him, and Chrom just smiled.

"...You did come from my version of Ylisse," the tactician said abruptly. "So that would be why you think of me more than her. Obviously."

Chrom blinked, then nodded halfheartedly. "U-um, yeah. That's probably...it?"

"Don't forget to finish sweeping." The pleading tone was all gone now, and Rufure now assumed a lofty air. "And throw that stupid wreath out. It should've died a long time ago."

Then he left again.

Chrom stared at him until the door slammed shut, and then sighed deeply.

_You're the best friend I've ever had, Robin,_ he thought wearily, _but you can be kind of a jerk sometimes._

…

As he stormed down the second floor hall away from his room, Rufure couldn't figure out why he was so angry. Maybe it was Chrom telling him what to read or not read, combined with the feeling of guilt he'd already _had_ about his choice of reading—maybe it was some natural response to this confusion—maybe he was just in a bad mood.

He really didn't know, but he decided that he should probably figure out where he was going. He slowed to a stop just outside the stairwell to other floors, and leaned against the wall, his eyes closed.

"...God dammit, Chrom," he said aloud after a minute. "Why do you have to go and say things like that..."

"Like what?"

The voice startled Rufure so badly, he let out a shriek and tried to jump backwards. He was stopped by the wall, of course, and winced in pain, rubbing the back of his head. "Oww..."

Ike started laughing. "Wh-what the hell was _that?_" he gasped through his amusement. "Oh, wow, Rufure...!"

The tactician glared at him, but then allowed himself to laugh as well. "You just s-startled me..." he admitted sheepishly. "Did you need something?"

The Radiant Hero managed to stop laughing and calm himself down, and Rufure noticed now that he was holding a paper in his hands, neatly folded in on itself. "I was just coming up the stairs when I heard you talking to yourself," he said. "What did Chrom say?"

"Nothing," Rufure replied automatically. "...Finish your letter?"

"More or less..." Ike looked down at the papers in his hand with a sad smile. "Nothing I come up with can really compare to being with him in person, but...the bus won't be leaving for Tellius anytime today, right? Ah..."

Rufure looked at him thoughtfully. "...Right. Well..."

"Did you and Chrom have a spat?" Ike inquired.

"A spa—no!" Rufure sputtered. "No, we did not! It's just he, he _says_ these things sometimes..."

"Everybody does, really."

"Not like this..."

"Did he say he hated you?"  
Rufure blinked. "...No."

"Did he insult you, or someone you love?"

"No."

"Then what's the problem?"

Rufure wished he could address things as simply and honestly as Ike did. But understanding what it meant when his heart started pounding at the sound of Chrom's voice...why he wanted to smile every time Chrom looked his way...why these things Chrom said, these odd things that just _toyed_ with his mind...that wasn't so easy.

"It's nothing," was all he said aloud.

Ike stared at him for a moment, then crossed his arms. "You know, whenever I hear someone say that, it tends to mean there's something."

"It's not like it has anything to do with you," Rufure said darkly. "Why do you care?"

"Because you look like a lovestruck puppy every time I say Chrom's name. Am I wrong?"

The tactician blinked again, and subconsciously was curious what defined the "lovestruck puppy" look. A part of him wanted to tell Ike to bug off, but another one kind of wanted to cry on his shoulder and tell him everything—and a third part was annoyed at the other parts for being so weird.

He had a brief mental cursing-out of himself, and then gave in and slumped down against the wall with a sigh. "It doesn't matter how I feel about him, because Lucina is here," he muttered. "He has a daughter, he...he can't like someone like me. He liked a girl, and had a daughter, so my feelings don't matter because I'm stupid male Robin and the kind of relationship I want is just...not...allowed."

"You'll really let that stop you?"

The hero's voice was harsh, and his words stung. "How would you understand?" Rufure snapped, looking up at Ike. "You're not nobility, and your husband obviously isn't either. Chrom is the _exalt of Ylisse._ He needs heirs, like Lucina, which means he needs to marry again...he needs to marry a _woman._ So he can have ch-_children..._"

The hitch in his voice was unintentional.

Ike looked at him for a moment. Then he dropped the letter at the tactician's feet.

Rufure picked it up, confused. "What's this for...?"

"You wanted info for your history books. Read this, then," the hero said bluntly. "I can always write it again. Read it, and...see if it helps."

Then he walked away, leaving Rufure on the floor by the wall with a letter in his hands.

_...Well, if he's invited me to, then..._

The tactician unfolded the letter and began to read the words, spelled out across the page in Ike's uncultured, passionate scrawl.

…

_ To my love;_

_ I wish I could be home for the holidays, but Master Hand wouldn't give me leave. Something about work I had to do, too much free time, I don't know...I don't know why he can't let us go home for the holidays, we're just hanging around here anyway because of all the snow. You wouldn't believe how much has fallen in just a couple days! We can hardly get out the door!_

_ I hope you're all having fun. How's Mist, and Titania, and the rest of the mercenaries? Tell them I said happy holidays! I miss you all!_

_ You don't know how much I wish I could be there...I can't remember the last time I was home. It's so hard, staying away...I never thought it would be this painful. The tournament seemed like such a fun thing, when I first accepted—fight a bunch of past and future heroes! Get away from your sad, boring life! Make new friends!_

_ ...I'd give up a million friends here for one day back home with you._

_ Just a year or two, he told me, when I first came here. Just a few years and then you can go back to Tellius, be with your husband, your family..._

_ Seven years now, since I came to the mansion. Six since the last tournament started, but seven since I left there, of course._

_ Time flies so quickly here, but when I stop to think about it, it seems like forever._

_ Sometimes I doubt that the conditions I made with the Hands for my participation weren't worth it. What was the point of saving your life, bringing you back to me, if we'd never see each other again?_

_ Then I remember how stupid that question is. Your life is the most precious thing in the world. On dark days, I just try to remember that if I hadn't done this...you'd still be gone. My life would be pointless without you._

_ And this way, even if twenty years pass before this tournament is finally over...I'll at least have that one day with you to keep me going._

_ Our wedding day..._

_ I can still remember what you looked like, waiting for me at the altar. I remember the way your green eyes sparkled, how the breeze blew your cape—how I was so nervous I nearly stumbled, but you stepped forward and caught me, and I almost wanted to fall just so I could be in your arms._

_ To love and to cherish...those were the vows we spoke. If there's any promise in my life that I will keep forever, it is that._

_ All the pain we went through, in those wars...how you fell in the Tower of Guidance, and how I was the one to deal the blow...I swear, I forget that when I'm with you. I don't feel pain when I'm with you, and when we're apart it feels like I'm dying inside, a little more every day._

_ One piece a day, and they're all resurrected by your voice. Your smile. Your eyes._

_ I'd give anything to be able to see you today. I still sleep with your picture under my pillow, and that gives me a little comfort._

_ Know that, no matter what happens, I am __always__ thinking of you. Always._

_ I love you._

_ I Love You._

_ I LOVE YOU._

_ I can't write that enough times in enough ways to express how much I mean it._

_ I love you._

_ I promise, I'll do my best to come home soon._

_ Happy holidays..._

_ With all the love in the world, Ike._

…

Rufure finished reading. Then he quietly folded up the letter again.

He felt a little guilty, a little sad—more than a little stupid.

And he had two things he needed to do.

…

Chrom had ultimately given up on the wreath, and gone downstairs to the main room instead to see if anything was happening.

The princesses were crowded up in one of the window seats, showing each other Christmas cards and chatting amongst themselves. Lucina, still wearing that ugly sweater Robin had lent her, was in a corner practicing the yoga poses the Wii Fit Trainer had taught her. The hylian hero, Link, was sleeping in front of the fireplace with a kitten on his stomach; Dark Pit seemed to be in the process of sneaking up on it. Marth and Pit were sitting together in the other window seat on the other side of the room, drinking out of mugs decorated with reindeer and other Christmas-type pictures. And Ike was in front of the fireplace, tossing crumpled pieces of paper into the flames.

Chrom went over to one of the big windows that lined the room, and looked out at the snow. It wasn't falling, at least, but the clouds overhead could mean more to come later. In the distance, he could just see a little orange of the Gunship, plowing the snow away.

Everything seemed pretty quiet, so Chrom considered going back upstairs. Not that there was anything to do up there, either—except something with that damned wreath, but he couldn't decide what to do with it ten minutes ago and nothing had really changed since then—

His thoughts were cut off by the sound of the door dramatically slamming open. It was a loud sound, loud enough to wake Link and the kitten, and it startled everyone into turning to see who it was.

It was Rufure, and his eyes were narrowed with determination.

Chrom frowned slightly. _That was quite an entrance..._

"Ike." The white-haired tactician strode across the room and dropped what looked like a piece of paper into the Radiant Hero's lap. "I thought you'd want this back."

Ike looked up at him, then down at the paper. He flipped it open, and another piece of paper slid out of it, which Ike picked up.

The way the hero's expression changed as he read the second paper couldn't be put into words.

"What is it?" Zelda now asked, voicing everyone's thoughts.

Ignoring her, Ike looked up at Rufure, his eyes wide. "A-are you...is this real..?"

Rufure nodded, then smiled. "I talked to Master Hand...we made a deal. Some extra work, some concessions were made, but...that doesn't matter. The bus may not leave for Tellius today, Ike, but it does leave tomorrow. At six in the morning. Merry Christmas."

Chrom may have been mistaken, but he thought he saw something not unlike tears glisten in Ike's eyes. The hero jumped to his feet, his expression one of purest gratitude, and hugged Rufure so tightly the tactician gasped a little for air.

"Oh, Gods, thank you so much," Ike barely managed, and then he ran past Rufure and right out the door.

Rufure had to pause for a moment to regain himself. Everyone was staring at him now in confusion, so they all saw exactly what he did next.

Turning smoothly on his heel, he walked right up to Chrom, pulled down the exalt's head and kissed him.

To say Chrom was shocked would be an understatement, but his surprise was nothing compared to Lucina's. She sort of shrieked and sort of fainted, staggering first into the wall and then down to her knees, which startled the kitten—which then jumped away from Dark Pit's lunge, much to his annoyance, but they were the only ones that weren't staring at Chrom and his tactician right then with a mixture of surprise, confusion, and absolute befuddlement.

Rufure finally let go of the bluenette and took a step back. His face was flushed a deep red, but he was smiling.

"I'm not sorry," was the first thing he said. "I know I'm just your best friend and you're going to marry another girl someday because Ylisse needs more heirs and a queen, but I just wouldn't have lived if I didn't do that once. I'm not sorry at all."

Chrom's jaw moved up and down, but words refused to come out. His mind was spinning, anyway, so any sound he might have managed to make would've been strange and confusing.

As it was, Rufure continued talking; "Gods, you're probably going to hate me now, and I don't know if I care or not. I attended your _wedding,_ for Naga's sake, and it's not your fault she died after having Lucina but it _is_ my fault for taking advantage of that," he babbled. "For taking advantage of you while you're away from Ylisse, away from those girls you like. I know you really like Sumia and Olivia and you're probably going to marry one of them and have a bunch of kids and that's fine, that's perfectly fine, but while we're here and away from all that I just had to do that _once._ Because Ike loves someone and he's barely seen him at all for seven years, _seven years_, and here I am moaning to myself about how I wish you felt the way I did but at least you're _here._ At least you're here and I get to see you every single day and Ike doesn't get that, and I-I, I'm still not sorry—"

Chrom finally seized onto a thought he was happy with. He took a step forward, and Rufure automatically stepped back himself, startled. Chrom took a second step and grabbed the tactician's arm, pulled him closer, and leaned down slightly to kiss him himself.

Lucina did faint this time. Nobody noticed.

"C-Chrom..." Rufure gasped.

"You were always so good at seeing when love was forming in others on the battlefield," the exalt murmured, "but you really never noticed it in me?"

"I-I, you...are y-you..." the tactician stammered stupidly. "W-what do you mean?"

"Think about it for a minute," Chrom said, a little teasingly. "You'll figure it out. How did you not notice Sumia was gay?"

Rufure blinked. "_What?_"

Chrom couldn't resist a laugh. "She's been with Cordelia since we first invaded Valm! How could you have missed that!?"

Rufure started to stammer again. "O-Olivia, then, certainly you're going to m-marry her—"

"_Robin_," Chrom interrupted. "I've talked with Lucina—_our_ Lucina, back in our Ylisse. She was an only child."

The tactician blinked again. "...I-I..."

"Smart as you are, you can be pretty blind sometimes," the exalt said lightly, and felt heat creeping up into his cheeks. "...I said I thought about you all the time, and that was true. I think about you all the time because I've been in love with you since the _first_ war ended, I only married Madelyn because Frederick said I needed an heir, and she knew that, and I was so sure that you would _notice_ me, Robin!"

Rufure stared at him for a moment, and then let out a half-choked laugh. "I thought, those things that you would s-say sometimes...I thought I was imagining they meant something more. I thought I was just desperate—Gods damn it, Chrom, why can't you be more obvious about these things!?"

"You're supposed to be the smart one!" Chrom said indignantly, his laughter escaping into his voice. "I'm just the dumb, dense lunkhead of an exalt, _you're_ the clever tactician. _You_ were supposed to notice how I felt and talk to me about it, not hang around moaning to yourself and waiting for _me_ to do something!"

Rufure started to laugh. "Right, b-because of course _I_ should've known you liked me the whole time. I should've g-_guessed_ that we secretly loved each other but never actually told each other because we were af-fraid to—damn, Chrom, this is the plot of _all_ of Sumia's romance novels!"

"We're a cliché, then," the exalt said happily. "Do you really care that much?"

"...No," the tactician murmured. "Of course not. I'll take this happy ending any day."

Chrom smiled. "Good, because I really want to kiss you again."

In reply, Rufure stood on his toes and wrapped his arms around the bluenette's shoulders; and Chrom pulled the white-haired boy up against him, kissed back, and thought he'd never felt so alive.

…

With perfect timing, of course, the other Robin walked in the room. Her voice gasping in surprise was the only thing that got them to separate, and it was only then that they wondered what to tell her and Lucina.

Well, that's what Rufure thought about. Chrom was suddenly struck by the thought that he hadn't put up that wreath, and Robin would be annoyed.

So when Rufure started trying to explain the situation, and Chrom started babbling about a Christmas wreath, Robin really didn't know what to think. So she finally just threw her hands up and left again.

"Have fun, lovebirds," she called as she went out the door. "I'll talk to Lucina later for you."

She knew her daughter would have a hard time understanding, but they'd figure it out. After all, this Chrom wasn't "technically" her father—_that_ Chrom was back in Ylisse, taking care of baby Morgan...so Lucina could come to terms with this other version of her father liking a guy, she was sure.

_ Two different versions of him, and they both love_ _a Robin,_ she thought. _Wonder why...maybe it's the hair..._

She went to her/their room, wondered where all the tinsel on the floor came from, and then saw the sad old wreath on her bed.

_...Where did _that_ ghastly thing come from?_

…

At six AM, in the morning of December twenty-third, a blue-haired hero bringing nothing but a small bag of clothes boarded the only bus that came to and from the Smash Mansion. The bus driver—a nameless entity with no describable or consistent appearance—couldn't help but notice the young man's excitement.

_"No Smasher's gone home for the holidays in years,"_ the bus driver said. _"How did you manage to get permission?"_

"My friend did it for me," Ike replied happily, wearing a rather silly grin that no Smasher had ever seen on his face before. "He made a deal with Master Hand...I'm not even sure what he traded to get this for me."

_"Must be a very good friend of yours."_

"...Not exactly. He's just...he's from the Fire Emblem universe, but I never even knew him very well." Ike looked out the window, as the doors of the bus closed and the ancient wheels began to turn in the snow. "...He just got together with his best friend, though. Yesterday. Maybe he had an idea of how it feels...to be away from home for so long. Away from those you love the most..."

Snow kicked up from the wheels and flew past the windows. _"A very lonely feeling,"_ the bus driver agreed.

"But now I'm going home." Ike leaned back in his seat and stared at the ceiling, a dreamy gleam in his eyes. "I'm finally going home...I'll finally get to see him again. It's been so long...I've missed him so much. I can't wait to hear his voice..."

The bus driver put its foot on the clutch and pulled down the shift stick. The snow and sky outside began to blur together, before vanishing entirely into darkness. The marquee on the front of the bus that declared the vehicle's destination changed from SMASH MANSION to TELLIUS.

_"Merry Christmas, then, my lord Ike."_

"You too," Ike replied, and smiled. "Merry Christmas."

* * *

**_A/N:_**

_This chapter is very Fire Emblem heavy, I know...for those who don't know much about that series, I apologize. The next one will have more variety. I promise! :D  
Hopefully I'll have it up by tomorrow. Wish me luck~ :3  
_

_As always, thanks for reading! Reviews are appreciated, and I hope you enjoyed~_

_~DarkieDucessa_


	3. Capture the Flag

It was the twenty-third of December, the sky outside was bright and blue, and nearly everyone was outside playing in the snow. Some had been building snowmen, others working to break icicles off of the mansion, but now everyone was taking part in for the Grand Snowball Capture-the-Flag Battle that the princesses had proposed. Shulk and Captain Falcon had been declared the leaders of Red Team and Blue Team, respectively, and had already gone through selecting their team members; now each team was on opposite sides of the Smash Grounds, preparing their snow forts and snowball arsenals.

Red Team consisted of Shulk, Marth, Pit, Bowser, Yoshi, King Dedede, Greninja, Jigglypuff, both Wii Fit Trainers, Mega Man, Mario, Zelda, Donkey Kong, Ganondorf, Peach, Pac-Man, Lucina, Villager, Robin, and Bowser Jr.

Blue Team was Captain Falcon, Dark Pit, Link, Charizard, Luigi, Kirby, Rufure, Chrom, Sonic, Meta Knight, Fox, Pikachu, Little Mac, Samus, Lucario, Ness, Falco, Diddy Kong, Olimar, and Toon Link.

When Peach had suggested that everyone participate, she did mean _every_one; the Smashers who weren't in teams—Rosalina, Duck Hunt, Wario, R.O.B, Mr. Game &amp; Watch, and Palutena—were the designated Jail guards. Jail was the Wii Fit Studio, which Fox and Falco had dug out yesterday and was roughly in the middle of the Smash Grounds, thus making it an ideal location.

The only missing Smasher was Ike, of course, who was home for the holidays; some thought it was a pity that he'd missed it, but they'd be sure to tell him all about it later.

…

Red Team had decided to set up their fort in Mushroom Kingdom U, where the few small walls provided some cover. Shulk delegated a third of Red Team to building the fort, the second third to building snowballs, and the last third to go out scouting in search of Blue Team's fort. Shulk himself made a few snowballs and kept a close eye on the flag.

Marth and Pit were in the snowball-creation division. The angel tended to pack a bunch of snow together in a rough spherical shape and call that good, and he made a lot very fast that way; on the other hand, the hero king's growing stack of snowballs, while smaller than Pit's, consisted of near-perfect spheres.

"I don't know why you spend so much time making them perfect," Pit was saying, packing together another rough ball for his arsenal. "We're just gonna throw 'em at Pittoo anyway, so does it matter?"

"Well, the rounder they are, the better they fly," Marth explained patiently. "They're more streamlined and thus fly in straighter lines, unlike those..._objects_ you're creating."

"They're snowballs!" Pit insisted indignantly.

"More like snow 'shapes', really," the hero king said teasingly.

The angel stuck his tongue out at Marth. "Feh! I've still got more."

"Quality over quantity, my friend."

"Not in snowball fights!"

Marth laughed. "I suppose we'll see when Blue Team arrives, in search of our flag."

Red Team's flag, hastily improvised, was actually Marth's cape. If you looked at it from one side, it matched the team color; from the other side, though, it looked just like Blue Team's flag (Chrom's cape), which was a little confusing.

Pit tugged at his scarf—it was the only one he had, and it was still extremely itchy—and laughed as well. "So, how's the holidays been for you so far?" he asked, his voice a little more subdued.

Marth smiled shyly. "...Good, actually. I can't remember the last time winter was this fun."

"Seriously?" the angel asked incredulously. "...I still don't get how _nobody_ noticed you were lonely on Christmas. How come you never spent it with Ike, or something?"

"They always had their own lives to live..." the hero king murmured. "My closest friends were always Ike, Link, Zelda and Peach...Ike was always sad himself around the holidays because he missed home, so he didn't pay any attention to me. Peach always gets caught up in the Christmas spirit so much she doesn't notice anybody around her. Zelda does that a bit, too. And Link tends to go off in his own world around this time of year. So...none of them really cared to look and see if I was having as much fun as them..."

"But I _can't_ have been the first person since Roy to talk to you about it," Pit persisted. "I refuse to believe you spent the last six or seven winters in your room feeling sorry for yourself!"

Marth looked up, frowning slightly. "...Is that how you see me, then..." he muttered.

The angel quickly tried to think of how to better phrase that. "U-um, that didn't, er, come out quite right. I mean..."

"No, you're right," Marth interceded, a little sadly. "...I _have_ spent the last seven years feeling sorry for myself. I just...I can't think of the holidays without thinking about..." He closed his eyes and set down the snowball he'd been working on. "...I'm sorry. I've been a bit of a wreck the past few days, haven't I?" he said softly. "I hate how I get so...I'm sorry."

_Damn it, Pit,_ the angel cursed at himself, _how do you keep managing to say stupid things!?_

"That's not true," he protested. "You're fine. I shouldn't keep bugging you about this—we're supposed to be making you happy memories, not talking about sad ones."

Marth nodded, hesitantly. "...Yes...happy memories. I...forget it."

There was a moment of silence, and then they went back to making snowballs. Pit tried to coax a sentence out of his companion, but the hero king had fallen silent.

Pit mentally cursed himself again.

…

On the other side of the grounds, in the Gaur Plains, the angel's dark counterpart had split off from the rest of the team and was building his own hoard of snowballs.

He was a fast and sloppy builder, not unlike Pit, and his pile was getting a little too big to carry. He did realize this, and took a break from building them to try and figure out how to transport them.

_Maybe the Guardian Orbitars can carry them for me?_ he contemplated. _Or...just wait around and see if he shows up by himself. Hah, like that's gonna happen._

"Hyaa!"

Not even startled, the dark angel glanced over as the hero of Hyrule landed nearby, sending up a huge puff of snow where he hit. "Hey, Link," Dark Pit said casually.

"Hai!" Link replied cheerfully, straightening himself. "Hih, haiyaa?"

"Going off by myself, that's what."

"Huht?"

Dark Pit snorted. "Please. We all know that Samus and the Captain will go after Red Team's base, and everybody else will stay back to guard the flag. And it'll work. Have you _seen_ those two...nothing ever touches Samus when she doesn't want it to."

Link frowned. "Hai...hah, huht."

"Yeah, but this isn't a fight to the death. It's snowballs."

"Hyaa?"

"Why would I be running away? Please." Dark Pit crossed his arms and looked down at his snowballs. "I just plan on using this opportunity to go after Pit." The dark angel smirked. "I haven't fought him in awhile...I'm looking forward to kicking his ass!"

Link thought for a moment. "...Huht," he said.

"...I know the Living Room isn't far from here, but this is no time to play with puppies and kittens," Dark Pit said firmly.

"Haii," Link insisted.

"Mittens will be _fine_ without us," the dark angel stated. "We don't need to play with him every day!"

"Hai huh! Hyaa!"

"...Oh, don't bring _that_ into this," Dark Pit said. "I don't care if he's making mushy eyes at Marth! I want to pound his face in!"

"Hai, haiyaa," Link said sternly. "Huht!"

Dark Pit grimaced. "But Marth might find it funny too..."

"Hai haiyaa!" the hero repeated.

"One assault," the dark angel found himself pleading. "I'll find him and throw this pile at him, and then we can go play with Mittens and I'll leave those two alone. Okay? Please?"

Link seemed to consider it. Then he smiled and nodded. "Hyaa!"

"Seventy percent? No way!" Dark Pit said, with a little laugh. "You can have forty percent of my snowballs."

"Haiht!"

"Fifty."

"...Hah."

"Fine, fifty-five. But that's it! And if you see Pit, you have to point him out to me!"

"Hyaa."

"Let's go, then." Dark Pit picked up something around half his snowball pile and dumped them in Link's arms. "You get to carry them!"

The hylian laughed cheerfully.

…

Back at Red Team's base, Zelda packed down another clump of snow onto the wall of their snow fortress, and then stared into the middle distance distractedly.

_I wish Shulk had picked Samus,_ she thought. _I'd rather not have to go after her..._

"Cap'n Shulk should've picked Samus, don't you think?" the blond next to her asked abruptly, voicing Zelda's thoughts exactly.

The brunette princess smiled. "Yes, she's so good at dodging and throwing...She and Captain Falcon will walk all over us."

"_That's_ not what I meant," Peach said, her mouth twisting into a wicked smile. "You never told me what you two talked about on the ice. You and Samus...Samus and you...together...alone..."

Zelda felt her face heating up, and ducked away to hide her smile. "Nothing, really," she said quickly. "We chatted about where we'd learned to skate, about Tink...that sort of thing."

"Come _on_," Peach teased, lightly poking Zelda in the shoulder. "That can't have been it! I left you alone together so long, you must have had some kind of meaningful conversation!"

"Life is not like a romance novel," the hylian princess said firmly, picking up another fistful of snow to pack down on the wall.

"Sure it is," the blond replied cheerily. "You were there yesterday, when Rufure and Chrom had their big kisses and revelations and declarations of love. Nothing I could've written would have been cheesier than _that!_"

"Even they thought it was weird!" Zelda protested. "Just because two boys have a romance that resembles fiction, doesn't mean leaving me alone with Samus Aran for a few hours will result in a meaningful conversation."

Peach pursed her lips. "But that was the whole point," she complained. "You two are so dense about these things, I've been doing my best to set you up together! Why won't you make connections!?"

"Because this isn't a romance novel," Zelda repeated, fully aware her face was all the way red now.  
"Sure sounds like it," the blond princess snorted. "She obviously likes you, you obviously like her, and both of you are too nervous to suggest that you date! It's straight out of a book!"

Zelda's blush deepened, if that was even possible. "It is _not,_" she said firmly. "And Samus is Samus...you really think she'd, um, ever actually 'like' someone like...er...me...?"

Peach started laughing. "You're practically _reciting_ _lines_ from my bookshelf now!"

"Okay, it sounded better in my head, but it's true," the hylian protested. "I-I mean, she's Samus Aran...cold bounty hunter, emotionless, businesslike, _cold..._"

"Snow's cold too, but everybody still likes it," Peach said reasonably. "And it can melt when it's warm. You just need to warm her up a bit."

"I don't think that's even possible," Zelda muttered. "You do realize that snow is lifeless, right?"

The blond princess smiled. "Only if you let it be."

Zelda frowned. "...That doesn't make sense."

"Just think about it a bit. Maybe you'll get it."

The hylian didn't really want to do that right now, so she tried to change the subject. "How have things been with Rosalina lately?"

Peach's whole face lit up in an instant. "Fan_tas_tic_,_" she said enthusiastically. "We had dinner together last night, and she let me braid her hair and read the Lumas a bedtime story. It was this Christmas story she'd gotten somewhere—it was just the cutest thing I've ever read! And when they're sleeping, wow, is she adorable. Er, are they. Well, they're all adorable when they sleep—Rosalina and the Lumas, I mean. Rosalina especially. Have I ever told you what a great kisser she's become?"

"Did not need to know that," Zelda mumbled, but she was smiling.

"I mean, she wasn't so good when we got together," Peach continued, ignoring Zelda, "but she must have been practicing because she's _really_ good now! Oh, and you should see her in my white dress, she's absolutely _radiant._ We tried on each other's dresses—I never realized how shiny hers is until I put it on, but _wow_..."

Peach continued talking, Zelda continued packing snow onto the wall, and everything was just fine.

…

Soon the fort was finished, and the scouts returned with news that Blue Team's fort was up in Super Mario Galaxy; Shulk picked out a team to go on the offense, and left the rest behind to guard the flag.

Marth and Pit were amongst the attackers, and the angel was still trying to get the hero king to talk to him.

"You know, I've been thinking, and Blue Team really does have an unfair advantage," Pit was saying to the unresponsive blunette. "Their flag is Chrom's cape, right? Well, one side of that is all white. So they've got camouflage! That's totally unfair, right?"

Marth made a noise and didn't say anything.

Pit sighed in frustration, grabbed Marth's arm and stopped walking. "Okay, Marth, this is ridiculous! Is this because I said you were feeling sorry for yourself? Did I do something else? I'm sorry! Whatever it is, I'm sorry, just _stop_ giving me the silent treatment!"

Marth stared at him for a moment, before finally speaking; "I'm not mad at you, if that's what you think."

"Then why haven't you been talking to me!?" Pit demanded. He could hear Robin shouting at them to hurry up, but he ignored that.

"I haven't...had anything to say." Marth's voice was very low and subdued, almost nervous.

"That's horse crap!" Pit spat. "You're either mad at me or sad again, aren't you?"

The hero king said nothing.

Pit finally snapped. "For the love of Palutena, Marth, will you stop keeping everything in!?" Marth actually took a half-step back. "I keep telling you again and again not to keep everything inside of you, to tell me if something's wrong, but you just refuse to talk because you just like to be sad all by yourself! If you're going to be like this, I don't know why I'm even trying!"

"Pit..."

The angel pulled his arm away from Marth, his eyes dark. "I'm so...I'm sick and tired of trying to help you and getting nothing but silence! If you can't tell me what's wrong, then I don't know what I'm supposed to do. You have to meet people halfway, Marth!"

"You think this is easy for me to talk about?" the bluenette suddenly snapped. "You think I can just chat about all my horrible memories like it was nothing!? It's _hard_ for me, Pit, it's Gods-damned _hard!_"

Then he turned and stormed off, despite Robin's shouts after him. Pit spun on his heel and stormed back to rejoin the group, his eyes glowering furiously.

_Stupid Marth, I know it's hard but you should try _harder_! I'm trying to _help_, damn it!_

…

Samus only agreed to play this game because Zelda and Peach coaxed her into it, but now she was on the other side from both of them and she wasn't in the best of moods. On the one hand, she wouldn't mind throwing a few snowballs at Peach—as much as she liked her, the blond princess could really get on her nerves sometimes—but on the other hand, she really didn't want to go after Zelda.

Of course, she was designated the scout to go look for Red Team's base right off the bat, and it didn't take her long to find it—nobody ever covered their tracks around here, and there was a very large trail leading straight to Mushroom Kingdom U. She crouched behind a big pile of snow and quietly spied on Red Team's doings.

Several of them were missing, she noticed; they must be out searching for Blue Team. She did a quick scan for Zelda, and spotted her just behind one of the walls. _Ah, so she is here..._

Samus considered attacking the fort by herself. Her teammates would probably prefer it if she went back and told them where it was, but she could see Marth's cape from here and had a good idea of how she might get it. They obviously hadn't spotted her yet—Zelda was in fact looking the other way entirely; their security was very lax. She could throw a few snowballs that way, a few over there, run right in and grab the flag...

_Red Team could really stand to work on their security,_ she thought with a little amusement. _They left their slow members behind, which means if I was fast enough I could grab the flag and nobody would be able to catch up to me. Mega Man might get close, but other than him..._

_ Except there's Zelda. I don't want to take her out..._

Her hesitation cost her, for she suddenly felt an explosion of cold on her back. Spinning around, she caught sight of a grinning Shulk, and realized she'd been hit with a snowball.

"It's off to Jail with you," he said cheerily, and she sighed in frustration. _Damn._

…

Pit was still in a horrible mood from his fight with Marth, so he snapped at Peach when she asked him what was up;

"Nothing at all, just that the stupid hero king is having problems and I don't see why you would care."

She frowned. "...What problems?"

Pit snorted. "Oh, just that he's been sad every single Christmas since he came here and _none_ of you ever noticed."

Peach was quiet for a long moment, so Pit mentally steamed. _Stupid Marth, stupid princess, stupid, stupid, stupid..._

"I...I guess I may have noticed," she finally said, her voice unusually subdued. "But he's always liked to keep to himself, so I thought...I thought he'd rather be left alone."

"That's his whole problem," Pit growled. "He just likes to shut everything up inside of him and he won't tell me what's _wrong!_"

The blond princess seemed be thinking. "...Well, I can't say I know him very well—Ike's his best friend, really—"

"Yeah, that's real helpful now that he's gone," the angel snapped.

"...But it was in December when Roy left," Peach finished gently. "Do you...Did anyone tell you why he left?"

"No."

"It was...he was injured."

Pit's curiosity was piked. "Injured...how? What about the safety?"

"He was testing Endless Smash..." the princess said softly. "Something went wrong. A glitch in the system...the safety went off, the stage wouldn't allow manual shutdown, and he still couldn't die. He was all but murdered, Pit..."

The angel's eyes widened. "..How...how did that happen? How could nobody have noticed that glitch?"

"Somebody was supposed to check the computer for glitches...before they tested it," she replied. "...But he was tired, Roy offered to do it for him, and he forgot to tell Roy to check." Peach looked down at her feet sadly, twisting her fingers together. "...Roy finally got to the edge of the stage and jumped, ending the match, but he was...destroyed. He should have...he should have died, but the universal safety wouldn't allow that, so he...he was in so much pain..."

Pit was still trying to digest this. "...But...so...what happened to him...?"

Peach took a deep breath to steady herself. "...Master Hand had to send him home. The bus, when it warps through the universe...it repairs you, back to the state you were in before you left. But if you try to come back, to this universe...you return to the state you were in when you left here. In his world, Roy is alive and well...but if he ever came back here, he'd be practically dead again. That's why...that's why he's gone."

The angel narrowed his eyes. "Who was the bastard who forgot to check for glitches, anyway!?"

"You didn't guess?" Peach smiled sadly. "...It was Marth."

Pit's stomach dropped. "...What...?"

"It was Marth." The princess looked away again, not meeting his eyes. "Marth was tired, Roy offered to test the stage for him, and Marth forgot to tell him to check the computer. He couldn't have known what would happen, but...Marth still blames himself."

She looked back up, and now she did lock her eyes onto Pit's. "That's...that's one of the reasons why Christmas makes him sad. Because Roy said it would be like a Christmas present...And Marth hates himself for it."

Pit stopped listening.

_What...why couldn't he just...why couldn't he TELL me that!? Oh, damn it, if it was me I wouldn't want to talk about it either...Gods damn it, Pit, you IDIOT!_

The angel abruptly spun about and ran back from where they'd come. Maybe Marth wouldn't have gotten far...

…

Samus didn't know if it was luck or if Shulk did it on purpose, but Zelda was the Red Team member chosen to escort the bounty hunter to Jail.

The two women walked in silence. Samus was pissed at herself for getting taken out, and Zelda just seemed to be thinking, so neither saw much need for speech.

At least it seemed that way, until Zelda stopped walking.

"Samus?" she asked hesitantly.

The blond cut herself off from her thoughts and replied; "What?"

"I was just...I was wondering what you thought of me."

"...Strange time to ask," Samus said cautiously, making sure her face betrayed no emotion.

"Is it? I figured, since we were alone..." Zelda's laugh was rather hollow. "I'm...curious, Samus."

_Well, how shall I put this..._

"You're a good person," the bounty hunter said flatly. "You care about other people more than yourself. You...make a good queen. Why do you ask?"

Zelda's face, though already red with cold, seemed to darken somewhat. "D-do you...do you mean all of that?" she asked nervously.

"Wouldn't say it if I didn't," Samus replied instantly.

Zelda stared at her for a moment. Then she smiled shyly.

"Thank you...but, may I ask another question?"

"Nothing stopping you," the blond said, though she was getting a little nervous about the way this conversation was headed.

The brunette looked at her for a long moment. Then she laughed hesitantly and turned away. "N-never mind."

They walked in silence for several more minutes.

_That was odd..._ Samus thought. _I wonder what she was going to ask..._

Almost as if she'd been reading the blond woman's mind, Zelda turned around again.

"You weren't there for Chrom and Rufure yesterday, were you?"

It sounded like both a question and a statement, so Samus wasn't sure how to respond. She went with "No."

"Has Peach already told you about them?"

"Um..."

"It was like something out of a romance novel," Zelda went on. "It turned out that they both liked each other for ages, but neither figured it out until yesterday, and it was because of a letter Ike wrote home that Rufure read or something that he finally came out with his feelings. And Lucina's been in shock ever since, but that's something else. Did she not mention it? It's all she's talked to me about."

Samus was a little confused. "...Why are you telling me about this?" she asked hesitantly.

"Oh..." Zelda smiled sheepishly. "I guess I'm just thinking about...how...those romantic clichés do happen in real life sometimes. Right?"

Samus stared. "Um...yes?"

"I just thought that would make what I want to say seem less...cheesy." Zelda laughed awkwardly. "I-I've liked you since forever and I didn't even realize it for the longest time. Peach did, that's why she's been trying to get us together. For months now. She thinks you like me too, a-and..."

_She's actually crying now,_ Samus thought shakily. _Why is she crying? W-why..._

"S-so after seeing them yesterday, I, um..." Zelda sniffed and smiled nervously. "I thought it couldn't hurt to see if she was right. So do you, er...oh, goddesses, I'm being too pushy, aren't I. I'm so horrible at this..."

"...Aren't we both..." the blond said hesitantly. "I've...never done this before."

Zelda blinked. "...S-so you do...?"

"You don't have to act surprised," Samus said with a weak laugh. "I'm more shocked than you right now. Believe me."

"But are you r-really...Do you really feel the same?" Zelda asked, a hopeful tone slipping into her voice.

Samus tried to reply, but her voice caught in her throat. She just nodded, and smiled nervously.

Zelda's face lit up so brilliantly, it almost made the bounty hunter want to cry as well. "Oh...Oh, thank you," the brunette said happily. She reached forward and slid her hands into the bounty hunter's, and her mittened fingers felt so small and cold against Samus's. "I-I'm so h-happy..."

The blond really had no idea what to do next, and racked her brains for the plots of romance novels that Peach had told her about.

_Well, usually after confessions of love there comes kisses,_ she recalled. _I guess I should...um..._

She tried leaning down and brushing her lips on Zelda's.

_That was a little...strange..._

Zelda responded by standing on her toes and pulling Samus' head down to give her a kiss.

_...Oh,_ Samus thought dizzily. _So this is what all the fuss is about..._

…

Pit found Marth sitting under a tree, his knees pressed up to his chest, on the outskirts of Pac-Land. This was one of the stages furthest away from the mansion, and the clouds slowly creeping overhead cast dark shadows in the snow-covered forest.

The bluenette looked up when Pit called his name, then grimaced and turned away again. "Go away," he said darkly.

"Marth," Pit repeated weakly, coming to a stop about ten feet from Marth's tree. "...Peach...she told me what happened. To Roy."

The hero king froze, but said nothing.

Pit wasn't quite sure why he was so nervous. "I-I'm...I'm so sorry. I shouldn't have kept pushing you to talk to me, _nobody_ would want to think about that—"

"It's not your fault," Marth interceded quietly, brushing his fingers aimlessly through the snow. "You didn't know."

"But I should've tried to find out sooner!" Pit insisted. "I should've talked to other people and not...pushed you, to remember things that hurt."

"You didn't think it would be...that bad," the bluenette said softly. "I don't blame you. I just...I want to be alone right now."

Pit frowned, then slowly walked around to get a better look at Marth's face.

_...I was right. He's been crying._

"You're...justified in being upset, Marth," the angel said quietly. "But that doesn't mean you should hide out here all by yourself."

"Please just go away," the bluenette repeated. "I don't want to talk."

"Are you sure you don't need to?"

"I need some _space_ sometimes, Pit!" Marth suddenly snapped, and swiped his hand violently through the snow, sending his abstract designs into powder. "I can't just talk about my feelings and have a cry on your shoulder and then everything will be _perfect_ again! I just _can't!_"

"Marth, listen to yourself," Pit said a little desperately. "You need to c-calm down—"

"What I need is for you to leave me alone!" the bluenette shouted, jumping to his feet. The angel was suddenly reminded of their eleven-inch height difference, and took a half-step back. "I can't, I-I can't _talk_ right now! I can't go crying to you or Ike or _anybody_ every time I get a little upset! Okay!? I _can't!_"

"M-Marth, you're scaring me," was all Pit said, in the simplest of tones.

Marth froze. Then he took a deep breath, and his expression softened.

"...I...I'll be fine on my own," he said quietly. "J-just leave me alone. I'll come back in a-an hour or two, and I'll...be myself again. I-I just..."

"...Marth...what kind of friend would I be if I did that?" Pit asked, taking a step forward.

The bluenette took a step back, and his back hit the tree. "P-please..."

"I can't pretend to know what your problems are," the angel said firmly, and took another step. "I can't pretend to know what it feels like to see your best friend almost die, or to be nearly murdered by your own wife for seventeen days in a row, but I _do_ know that whatever makes you think you need to deal with it alone is _wrong._"

"I-I'm...the Hero-King of Akaneia..." Marth said weakly, looking away, refusing to meet Pit's eyes. "S-so many people...look up to me...I need to be s-strong for them. I have to..."

"You have to _nothing!_" Pit cried, and lunged forward before Marth could step away from him again. He grabbed the bluenette's wrists and held him tightly, so he couldn't get away. "You think you would have ever become the Hero-King if you weren't already strong!? You _are_, Marth, you are strong and kind and sweet and caring and _beautiful_, and people look up to you because of who you are and won't think less of you for letting your friends try to _help you!_"

Marth sniffled slightly. "I-I'm not...all those things you said."

"Of course you are!" Pit insisted.

"I a-am not. I-I'm not...I'm not w-worthy of such praise."

"_Marth._" The angel released the hero king's wrists so he could reach up and turn his head, make Marth meet his eyes. "If you're not worthy of that, then nobody is." He smirked slightly. "You're also worthy of being called a little thick. Did I mention that?"

Marth blinked. "Wh-what do you mean?"

"Come on! You're sad, so you assumed the best solution was to cry all by yourself rather than just let a friend help?" There was a brief pause. "...Was that something stupid again? Did I just..."

"It wasn't _that_ stupid, b-but you have said it multiple times already." Marth seemed to be laughing and crying at the same time, but the latter didn't matter because his smile was _beautiful._

"Sorry," the angel said. "I'm sorry. Tell me when I say stupid things from now on, so I can stop!"

"It's...it's fine." Marth closed his eyes. "...Sometimes we need to hear stupid things...it makes us think clearer..."

Pit frowned. "That doesn't make sense."

Marth just laughed. "Regardless...Thank you. Pit. Thank you..."

…

Link grabbed Dark Pit's arm before he could throw a snowball.

"Hey!" the dark angel whispered in annoyance. "What was that for?"

"Hai," the hylian said softly.

"...I don't care if they're 'having a moment' or 'working through their problems' or whatever—Pit's sitting _right there_ and I want to hit him with a snowball," Dark Pit said stubbornly, though he kept his voice low.

Link smiled softly. "Hah...hyuht."

"...Can't they have their moment again in Jail?"

"Hyaa."

"Oh, fine," Dark Pit growled in annoyance. "But I get to hit him twice as much later. Like, with shovelfuls of snow. I'll dump shovelfuls on him as he tries to walk into the mansion...Can I do that?"

"Hai!" Link said sternly.

"It's not a stupid grudge match," the dark angel muttered. "It's a _cause._ One that I'm devoted to, and you're lucky you're stopping me right now as it is."

"Huht."

"Fine, but I get Mittens first..."

So the dark angel and the hylian hero went away, and left the Hero-King and the angel alone once more.

…

In the end, Blue Team won the game when both teams decided on near full-out assaults at the same time, met in the middle, and had quite the battle. Nobody was sure which side was winning, but in the midst of the chaos Sonic ran straight past all of Red Team, all the way to their fort, stole the red flag, and ran all the way back to Blue Team's base before anyone even noticed it was gone.

It was quickly decided that he should be forced to wear leg-weights the next time they played (much to his chagrin), and then everybody went inside to dry off. Rosalina and Peach made hot chocolate for everybody, Rufure got a fire going, and the wettest of Smashers crowded around it with blankets wrapped around them, to chat and relax.

Hardly anyone failed to notice Samus and Zelda holding hands the entire time—and gold exchanged a few hands, because they'd seemed so obvious to some that bets had been made. Fortunately, they didn't know this, or Samus might've been offended and knocked a few heads around.

Nobody commented on Dark Pit and Link's absence from the majority of the game, either—though seeing as a kitten was sleeping on the dark angel's lap, and a puppy on the hylian's, everyone knew where they'd gone.

And almost nobody noticed that Marth, settled so comfortably in the window seat with Pit sleepily leaning against him, was actually crying. His smile was so radiant that nobody looked past it to spot the tears glistening in his eyes.

Even if he couldn't escape his sadness, at least he wasn't crying alone anymore.

* * *

**_A/N:_**

_I have discovered that if I give myself a six-day deadline to write a four-chapter story involving a lot of romance...it's going to turn into horrible romance clichés and stupid drama. For that, I apologize...maybe sometime after Christmas I'll come back and rewrite the whole thing? Ahaha..._

_Yeah, I'm not sure I'm too happy with this story, but I'm going to finish it anyway. Expect an update before Christmas! ...I hope. xP_

_Once again, thank you for reading, reviews are appreciated, and I hope you enjoyed (even a little)~_

**_~DarkieDucessa_**


	4. Christmas Eve

It was December the twenty-fourth, otherwise known as Christmas Eve, and many of the Smashers were getting ready for the holiday that was less than twenty-four hours away. Decorations were being put up or repaired, snowmen were being built, and preparations were being made to go into town. Every year on Christmas Eve, the Smashers were given leave to go into Nintendo Park, a relatively small city some hundred miles away, for their Christmas shopping. This year, however, the bus had been delayed by the heavy snowfall, and so Samus' Gunship was the most reliable form of transportation they had—she could only bring two or three with her at a time, though, so most of the Smashers were still at the mansion.

Peach had decided that, rather than going into town and buying gifts for everyone, she would instead make the best Christmas and Christmas Eve dinners she'd ever made for _every_body, and be sure that the whole mansion was alive with the holiday spirit she loved so much.

She was currently in the kitchen, planning out the menu for the grand dinner she was planning for tonight. The Assists had already gone home for Christmas, and some (the Hands, R.O.B, Mr. Game &amp; Watch) never ate, which meant there were just the forty-eight or so Smashers to worry about.

(Nobody was quite sure why the Assists got holiday leave and the Smashers didn't, as Master Hand never gave a straight answer when he was asked.)

_Let's see,_ the blond princess thought as she flipped through her massive fourth-edition _Recipes of the Mushroom Kingdom_ cookbook. _We've got meat-eaters and vegetarians, and the occasional vegan, so we'll have to cover all of those. The Kongs will want banana-heavy foods, but Shulk hates bananas...A lot of them will eat anything, but some are within reason. Like Samus, for instance, she doesn't like broccoli. Or pork products. Can't give those to Ganondorf, either. Hrm..._

She glanced up when she heard footsteps, and saw Rosalina standing in the door. She smiled. "Oh, hello!"

"Hello," the ash-blond replied, smiling gently. "How is the planning going?"

"Oh, I'm barely getting anywhere," Peach said, waving her hand nonchalantly. "I need banana foods for the Kongs but have to keep those away from Shulk, I can't give food with pig in it to Ganondorf or Samus but that's also Lucina's favorite, and Gods forbid I try and serve duck anywhere near that dog!"

"I suppose there is no universal food that everyone would be happy with," Rosalina said with a laugh.

"I suppose so," Peach agreed. "I mean, even chocolate...Dark Pit hates chocolate. How can _anybody_ hate chocolate!?"

"Not that that would be the best choice of dinner," the other princess said logically.

"I know, but still..." Peach sighed and flipped the page. "And I don't even remember who's allergic to what anymore..."

"I believe Little Mac is allergic to rye," Rosalina offered.

"..Okay. Anyone else?"

"...Sheik may have a cheese allergy?"

"That's possible?"

"I think so."

"Augh...Please don't tell me somebody's allergic to salt."

"I do not believe that one exists..."

Peach laughed, then sighed and flipped through several more pages. "Maybe I should go ask Master Hand for some files on everyone, so I'll know the specifics better...Does he have those? He should!"

"Peach." Rosalina was suddenly at her side, and put a hand on her shoulder gently. "Do not overwork yourself..."

The princess sighed again. "I'm fine, Rosy, I promise. Just trying to figure out what to do with this."

"Shall I go ask Master Hand for information on the Smashers' eating habits, as you suggested?" she queried.

"That would be great!" Peach replied enthusiastically.

"And then I will come back to help." Rosalina brushed some of the other princess's hair aside and kissed her gently on the forehead. "I shall not be long."

Peach blushed faintly and shivered under Rosalina's touch. "Great," she whispered, smiling.

"Don't go anywhere," the ash-blond said sweetly, and then she was gone.

Peach quietly giggled, and started flipping through her cookbook in earnest. _Maybe if I make this and this, but keep that one away from him, and can't forget about this one either..._

"Oh, Peach?"

The blond princess glanced up again. Rosalina had ducked back in the room. "Yes?"

"The dinner will be fine. No matter what you come up with, it will be wonderful." The ash-blond flashed a smile. "So do not worry too much. Okay?"

Peach nodded. "Of course!" she said cheerily. "When have you ever seen me worry?"

Rosalina just smiled again, and then departed.

…

In Nintendo Park, the snowfall had been light and fluffy, only gently dusting the town with white—a stark contrast to the weather around Smash Mansion. A gentle snow was falling now, Christmas decorations lined the streets, and happy Christmas music rang through the air.

Normally, Dark Pit would've hated this. All these happy mushy people with their happy mushy feelings...it got on his nerves, really. What was so exciting about the end of the year, anyway? It was dark, it was cold, it was _winter_ for crying out loud!

But Link obviously loved Christmas, and his enthusiasm was infectious. As the hylian and the dark angel walked down the street, he marveled at the lights and decorations they passed, and insisted on stopping at _every_ shop window.

Dark Pit found he couldn't help but laugh as the hero pointed out a tall holiday-themed scratching post in one of the windows, complete with snowflake and evergreen tree patterns.

"You already got Mittens a scratching post," he remarked with a chuckle, nodding at the long oddly-shaped package Link carried over his shoulder. "He really doesn't need two."

"Hyaa!" Link said reasonably.

"Actually, I think you _can_ have too many scratching posts," Dark Pit countered. "...You could always get it for Zelda, I guess, but I doubt she really needs a scratching post."

"..Hai?" the hero suggested.

"I don't need to give Mittens gifts to show my affection," the dark angel said with a sniff. Then he laughed. "And I already got him a catnip mouse, remember? So he can have that, and then go psycho on your scratching post."

"Huht," Link agreed with a smile. "Haiyaa?"

"Pit?" Dark Pit frowned. "...I could give him a catnip mouse, too."

The hylian laughed. "Hyuht, hai!"

"Well, that is a good idea, but he'd probably rather be left alone with Marth. Remember?" The dark angel shaded his eyes and squinted into the window again. "What with that whole breakdown argument crying fest they had yesterday, or whatever. Their relationship is very emotional, isn't it?"

"Hyaa." The hero nodded. "Huht?"

"No, I doubt there will be any 'happy announcements' by the end of the week," Dark Pit said with a laugh. "Though if they start making out, I wouldn't be surprised."

"...Hai," Link said gently.

"...Yes. They do deserve to be happy," the dark angel agreed softly. "...Actually, should I get something for the puppies, too? Will they be jealous if only Mittens gets presents?"

Link frowned. "...Hyuht!" he said worriedly. "Hyaa!"

"Maybe we can get them...um...bones?" Dark Pit said hesitantly. "I don't know what to get for dogs..."

Link glanced around, then apparently spotted something in a window across the street. "Hah!" he said excitedly, and made a dash for it, narrowly dodging a car. Dark Pit sighed, then laughed and ran after him.

"What is it?" he shouted.

The hylian stepped out of the way of Dark Pit's view and pointed, a grin on his face. "Hai!"

It was only then, when he saw what Link liked, that the dark angel realized this was a pet store. And what the hero was pointing out was a cardboard box.

It may have formerly been a box of _Corneria Crackers_, but it had been re-purposed, and the rough scrawl on the side read _Take Me Home!_ Inside the box was a thin blanket, and one very small, very lonely-looking orange tabby kitten.

Dark Pit blinked. "...Where did that come from...?" he asked vaguely.

Link shrugged, then repeated; "Hai!"

"But what about—oh." The dark angel frowned. "We already have a kitten. Won't he be jealous if we get another?"

"Hyuht," Link said logically.

"...Getting another kitten so you can get a second scratching post is _not_ a good reason," Dark Pit said firmly. "No matter how pretty it is."

The hylian looked sad. "...Hah..." he said softly.

"I _know_ it looks lonely, but..." Dark Pit looked back at the kitten in the box.

It looked up at him with the biggest blue eyes he'd ever seen, and then, though he couldn't hear it through the glass, it meowed.

The dark angel's heart melted.

"...What are we going to call him?" he asked awkwardly.

Link's eyes lit up brilliantly. "H-hyaa?"

"Yes, you doofus, we can get another kitten." Dark Pit laughed. "I'll even pay for it. Merry Christmas."

The hero bounced a little on his toes in excitement. "A-ah! Th-th-th-than-n-nk y-y-you!"

His stammering was awkward, and the words difficult to understand—but then, Link was never easy to understand unless you really listened.

Dark Pit felt his ears heating up, and genuinely smiled. "N-no problem. So what are we going to call it..."

"P-p-p-pit-t-too?" the hylian suggested.

The dark angel scowled. "Hell no!"

"Aww..."

"Socks?"

"...Huht."

"Boots is practically the same thing as Socks."

"Hyaa!"

"How is 'Boots' more masculine, and why does it matter? Isn't it a female kitten?"

"Haiyaa, hyuht!"

"...Oh. I see. There are a lot of male kittens around."

"Hai?"

"I still prefer Socks..."

And, laughing amongst themselves, they went into the shop to get their Christmas present.

…

Though they didn't know it, not far from them there was another angel shopping in Nintendo Park. Pit was in a thrift store, having already wandered through the bigger retail store and not finding something close to what he really wanted.

Marth hadn't minded the change of venue, and Pit could see him over the racks of clothes, looking at the tag on a dark purple holiday sweater. The angel briefly imagined what Marth would look like wearing the sweater, and smiled in embarrassment when he imagined what Marth might look like wearing nothing _but_ the sweater.

He ignored the heat in his ears when that thought struck his mind, and went back to the box of ornaments he'd been going through. He liked looking for these things in thrift stores—the ornaments were always cheaper, but prettier and more unique than the ones at the retail store. Still, none of these were quite what he wanted.

Marth's gentle voice interrupted his search. "Find anything good?"

"Oh, they're all really nice, but I can't very well buy everything in the store..." Pit said, turning to face the hero king.

Marth was wearing the sweater, and now that he was closer, the angel could see the pink lining with little hearts on the sleeves and neck. Despite himself, he blushed. "...I-isn't that a girl's sweater?" he asked awkwardly.

The bluenette shrugged. "So? How do I look?" He extended his arms and did a little spin.

_My gods, he looks adorable._ Pit couldn't resist a little giggle.

"I'll take that as a compliment," Marth said cheerfully.

Oh, how glad Pit was that Marth was finally feeling better. They'd spent all day together and been happy the whole time, and Pit just _knew_ this time that the bluenette wasn't faking it. It was Christmas Eve, and he finally wasn't sad anymore—and Pit felt on top of the world.

"Are you looking for anything in particular?" Marth queried, and the angel snapped out of his thoughts.

"Oh, no, not really," he said hastily. "How about you? Were you really looking for a sweater?"

Marth shrugged again. "No, but that's why I love coming to thrift stores. You can wander around and find things you didn't even know existed."

Pit laughed. "Yeah. Anything else good? Should we get everybody sweaters for Christmas?"

"This one was the best," the bluenette replied. "I did see some really nice dresses..."

"Oh, the princesses would like those," the angel mused.

"...Or we could try them," Marth said sneakily.

Pit blushed. "W-what? Why?!"

"Why not?" The bluenette laughed. "I think you'd look pretty good in a dress."

The angel was instantly struck with imaginings of Marth in pretty dresses...and his blush deepened._ Stop that, Pit, I don't care how pretty he is in a dress! I-I mean..._

Marth laughed again. "Come on, Pit, wouldn't it be fun? There was this white dress that was really nice—I think it was your size! And it had a low back, so your wings would work with it. Want to try it?"

"Y-you put on a dress first..." the angel replied shakily.

The bluenette smiled. "Sure, but then you definitely have to put on the dress. Okay?"

"Alright." Pit finally laughed as Marth ran back towards the clothes, and wondered what the hero king would put on...

Turning back to the ornaments, he shuffled through the box a little more before he came across something that was exactly _perfect._ A little gold star, with snowflake designs around the base.

Pit picked it up carefully, and realized it was made of a delicate ceramic. He held it with care and turned it around in his hands, and smiled.

_You said this was your favorite ornament when you were a kid, Marth,_ he thought. _I hope giving this to you won't make you sad again, but...Maybe it'll bring back memories of those good Christmases, eh? Haha..._

He took the ornament over to the cashier's desk and asked if she would hold it for him—"It's a present for my friend, but he's here with me and I don't want him to see me getting it," the angel explained. "So if you could hold onto it for an hour or two, and then I'll grab it on the way out?"

She nodded. "Certainly!"

He thanked her profusely, and then made his way to the dress rack. It was near the changing rooms, and he could tell Marth was in one, so he busied himself flipping through the dresses.

He found a small-ish white one with a low back and flower embroidery on the skirts, and assumed that had been what Marth referred to. Curious, he took it off the rack and held it up against himself, and looked in the mirror.

It fell to about his knees, and the sleeves seemed short, but he was pretty sure it would fit. He also thought he might not look half-bad in it, and smiled to himself.

_Marth, would you think I was pretty in this?_ he wondered. Then blushed again. _You probably would, you bastard. How can I _not_ wear it now?_

Just then, he heard the changing room door open, and quickly lowered the dress from himself and turned to see.

Yes, Marth was wearing a dress. A long-skirted, low-necked, poofy-sleeved dress of dark blue and violet silk, which kind of looked like the only thing it was missing was a hoop skirt.

Pit stared. Marth saw him, came over, and did a little spin. "How do I look?" he asked sweetly, a faint blush on his face. "Should I wear this all day tomorrow?"

"Oh, y-yeah," the angel stammered. "V-very, er, Christmas-y..."

Marth laughed. "You have to admit, it would make the day more interesting."

"I w-wouldn't deny that..." Pit smiled. "You are _really_ pretty, you know. Beautiful."

The bluenette smiled shyly. "Well, thank you very much. I'm sure you're far prettier than I in a dress."  
"What does that mean?" the angel sputtered, but then he laughed. "I guess you aren't gonna let me go anywhere until I try this on, are you..."

Marth took a step forward abruptly and wrapped his arms around Pit, causing the boy to let out a little gasp. "Not a chance," the bluenette said fondly.

Pit was startled, but didn't resist. He loved how this felt—being in Marth's arms.

"I really like you," he mumbled suddenly. "Really, really, _really_ like you."

There was a brief moment of awkward silence.

Then Marth gently kissed the top of Pit's head.

"I really like you, too..."

…

Elsewhere in Nintendo Park, Robin was trying to coax the family (of sorts) into Christmas caroling.

"Come on," she pleaded, "it'll be fun! I know you guys can sing, so we won't sound bad!"

"That doesn't mean it won't annoy people," Rufure countered. "Who would want to listen to us wailing out songs that everybody already has stuck in their heads?"

"People who don't have them stuck already?" Robin suggested.

"...No, Robin."

The female tactician growled. "Come on, Lucina. Chrom. You're on my side, right?"

"O-of course, Mother," Lucina said hesitantly. "Though I don't know how good I am..."

"You're fine, dear," Robin said automatically. "Chrom?"

Chrom had his arms crossed and was looking the other way. "I already said 'no'."

"But it'll be _fun!_" she insisted. "And if you come along, then Rufure will! Pleeeease?"

"Why do you want to do this so much?" Rufure asked wearily.

"..Because it's fun," she stubbornly repeated.

The male tactician sighed. "That's not a good reason, Robin."

"What would we even be singing?" Chrom queried, and Rufure shot him a glare.

Robin's expression, on the other hand, brightened. "Oh, we have lots of music!" she said enthusiastically, pulling out a folder absolutely stuffed with sheet music. "I have Christmas songs, general holiday songs, general other nice songs, some winter holiday songs from back home..."

Rufure perked up a little at that. "Do you have that one song Tiki really likes? Um...I'm assuming she also likes it in your version..."

"You mean the one that she sings at least three times literally every Christmas?" Robin asked with a laugh. "The one that's practically her theme song? I'm surprised you aren't sick of that one."

"Well, it's not a bad song," Rufure said, smiling.

"I do have the music for that..." She flipped through her folder really fast, then selected a paper and pulled it out, handing it to Rufure. "Here you go!"

"Changing your mind, Robin?" Chrom asked with a smile.

Rufure shrugged. "Maybe...if we have actual good music..."

"I like that one song that was playing on the radio in Samus' ship," Lucina volunteered. "What was it called? 'Silent Night', perhaps?"

"That one's not bad," Robin agreed.

"Eh..." Rufure glanced over the lyrics in his hand, then looked at Chrom. "...Maybe we can go down one street?"

"Two streets!" Robin insisted.

"One and a half," Chrom countered. "And then we'll see if it's fun enough to keep going."

The female tactician grinned. "Done! What song should we start with..."

She started flipping through her folder again, while Chrom glanced around at the stores nearby. He saw one in particular and his eyes lit up, and he quickly said that he'd be right back before going in.

Rufure read through some of the sheet music Robin handed him for a few minutes. Then he yelped when somebody put something soft and fuzzy on his head. "What the heck?"

He turned and met Chrom's bright face. The exalt was now wearing a red and white fuzzy Santa hat, and as the fuzzy ball on the end bounced around in his face, Rufure realized what he was wearing as well.

"We can't go caroling without the proper getup," Chrom said cheerfully.

Rufure made a face. "I always thought Santa hats were dorky."

"Well," Chrom replied, moving in closer, "they look rather cute on you."

The tactician blushed. "S-stop that," he mumbled. "You'll make Lucina faint again..."

"I don't care," the exalt replied softly, and leaned down to give Rufure a gentle kiss on the mouth.

_Poof!_ Lucina was down in the snow.

"Stop making my daughter faint!" Robin chided them, annoyed.

"It's her own fault for having a weak constitution," Rufure replied with a laugh, wrapping his arms around Chrom's waist. "Besides, you're pretty much the girl version of me, so she should be used to seeing these two people together."

Robin scoffed and bent down to try and shake Lucina awake. Chrom rested his chin on top of Rufure's head and started humming "Silent Night."

"There's also that song Lissa likes around this time of year," Rufure murmured, then sang quietly under his breath; "_We wish you a merry Christ-mas, we wish you a merry Christ-mas..._"

"You have no idea how well I know that song," Chrom said quietly with a laugh. "She sings it every year. _Every. Year._ Since she was _five._ I've got it memorized..."

Rufure laughed. "Guess we can start with that one, dear."

"If you insist, honey."

The tactician chuckled, then leaned back so he could stand on his toes and kiss Chrom again.

_Poof!_ Lucina, who'd just gotten up, was down for the count once more.

…

Much later on, Peach and Rosalina's dinner had been successfully created and served without a hitch—well, there was a brief incident where the allergic Falco had nearly eaten a dish with peanuts in it, but Kirby's quick reaction time and Inhale saved the day. Not that Falco enjoyed being inhaled in the middle of his Christmas Eve dinner, but everything was eventually explained and forgiven.

It was very late now, and all the Smashers were back at the mansion, settling down for the night. A variety of wrapped presents had been put under the massive tree in the main room—from Shulk's perfectly wrapped gifts to Pit's rather haphazardly wrapped packages. Most of the Smashers were already upstairs and asleep, but some were still downstairs—Dark Pit, for instance, was dozing on Link's shoulder, the new kitten sleeping in his lap and Mittens sleeping in the hylian's. Rosalina and Peach were cuddling in one of the window alcoves, not talking but just quietly enjoying each other's company.

Zelda and Samus were in the other alcove, looking at the snow that had gently begun to fall once more. The princess's head was propped up against the Samus's chest, her arms wrapped around the blond's waist and Samus' arms around her.

"Do you think we'll still have all this snow by New Year's?" Zelda asked quietly.

Samus shrugged. "Probably, unless we have a heat wave."

"That would be peculiar," the princess commented. "And I hope it doesn't happen. I like the snow."

"The Hands will probably get rid of it soon," the blond stated. "Before the holiday break is over, definitely."

Zelda sighed. "Yes, indeed, but we must enjoy it while it lasts..."

"Of course."

From somewhere above them in the mansion, the clock began to strike. One, two, six, twelve strikes. It was midnight.

Zelda twisted around to look up at Samus' face. "Merry Christmas, my lady Aran," she murmured sweetly.

The blond leaned forward to give the hylian a gentle kiss on the forehead. "Merry Christmas, your Majesty."

"Would you like to open your present?" Zelda asked teasingly.

Samus laughed softly. "I think it's too early for that."

"Mmm, if you insist..." Zelda pushed herself up so she could plant a kiss on Samus' lips. "Shall we go listen to Robin singing Christmas carols in her sleep, instead? Her and Rufure and Chrom's room is right next to mine, and she's quite loud."

Samus laughed softly. "Sounds good to me."

And so they went upstairs, and eventually fell asleep curled up together on Zelda's bed to the sound of Robin's gentle singing.

* * *

_"We wish you a merry Christmas,_

_ We wish you a merry Christmas,_

_ We wish you a merry Christmas,_

_ And a happy new year!"_

* * *

**_A/N:_**

_Well, I said I'd finish it and I did. Finally it's a little more Christmas-y! Ahaha...  
...yeh, I'll probably delete this sad little thing in a month or two..._

_But for now, anyway. Merry Christmas! Happy Holidays! And a very happy New Year! :D  
Thank you for reading!_

**_~DarkieDucessa_**


End file.
